by Dr Rahim Said
Regret at 85 is a little late, isn’t it? But the wonderful news is this: it’s never too early — or too late — to reshape your story, brighten your days, and choose joy from this moment onward.
Just the other week, a Tan Sri — a man who had travelled the globe, led empires, and collected life experiences the way some people collect fridge magnets — sat with me over a humble cup of teh tarik in TTDI. He sighed, looked out the window, and said, “I regret what I didn’t do. If I could live again, I’d live differently.”
Imagine that. Someone who had it all wishing he’d done more — or dared differently. It reminded me how regret works: not as a loud disaster, but as a quiet shadow.
It slips in through the dreams we delay, the “later” we never get to, the roads we fear to travel. Robert Frost knew this when he wrote about choosing the familiar road… and forever wondering about the one just beside it.
But here’s the cheerful truth: regret doesn’t have to be your future companion. Not at 50. Not at 70. Not at 85. Not at all.
I decided early that I wanted my older self to smile, not sigh. In my twenties — with “a dollar in my hand and a pocket full of sand” — I wrote down three little dreams in a tiny room in Upstate New York as snow piled up by the window:
• Get married by 40.
• Publish a book or two.
• Have a million in the bank.
Simple? Maybe. Impossible? Not at all.
Any life coach will tell you: write it down. Stick it on your bathroom mirror. Tell the universe. And Paulo Coelho reminds us that when something is truly meant for you, the universe will conspire gently, quietly, beautifully to make it happen.
And it did.
At 39, I met and married the woman of my dreams.
At 40, my first book — co-written with the late Mansor Ahmad Saman — was published, winning a national award and setting us on a path to many more works.
And the million? That came not with fanfare, but like a pleasant surprise knocking on my door one ordinary day — the way blessings often do.
But the brightest gifts? Two children who transformed the meaning of fortune altogether.
So now, at 79, sitting under a cheerful December sky, I look back at that young dreamer in New York and smile. Regret? No — gratitude. Because life gave me what I asked for, and much more.
And that is what I want to offer you today.
If you’re wrestling with regret, or standing at the edge of a decision that scares you, breathe.
Pause.
Listen to your own heart — not society, not fear.
Write down what you truly want.
Take one small step toward it.
Then another tomorrow.
Let the universe do its gentle work.
You don’t have to wait until 85 to say, “I should have.”
You can begin at 25, 45, 65 — or right now, while your eyes glide across these words.
Life shines brightest not when it is perfect, but when it is lived bravely, intentionally, joyfully.
And if the sky is smiling on you today — as it is on me — perhaps it’s offering a simple reminder:
It is not too late.
It is not too early.
It is exactly the right moment to choose a life with no regrets.
WE