- I have never regretted ignoring the unsolicited advice of others
- I have regretted, sometimes for years, trying too hard to please others
this post was submitted on 19 Jan 2026
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I was too kind to people who didn't deserve it and not standing for myself has been a bigger regret.
The biggest mistake of my life was an act of kindness.
I'm still kind when I can be, but I'm always ready to regret.
Kindness to those who genuinely deserve it is a good thing. Just don't allow your kindness to make you naive
I have regretted both. Sometimes you'll just get punished for trying to help.
For me, even when a kind act goes punished, I don’t regret the actual decision even if I wish I could have prevented the unintended consequences. But I make an effort to believe that making the right decision is valuable in of itself
Sometimes you'll reap enormous rewards through selfishness and cruelty.
I guess the market has spoken. Be a sociopath.
What if you don’t have the mind for that?
Kill the part of yourself that's holding you back. Hollow yourself out into you are an empty husk, an all consuming void, that relentlessly hungers but can never be filled.
I wish to make certain that everyone is aware this is sarcastic advice, do not do this.
Do you regret the action if kindness itself, or do you just abhor the response you got from it?
I have regretted, sometimes for years, not indulging in a selfish impulse.
Ah yes, this is why the phrase "no good deed goes unpunished" does not exist.
Oh there are plenty of instances of kindness I've regretted. Far more than cruelty since I avoid cruelty. Still, I'd rather regret a failed act of kindness than succeed in an act if cruelty.
Yeah, I'm in this camp too
Yeah I allowed my own kindness to lead me into a manipulator's grasp. But then I think about what a friend told me after, how she'd rather be taken advantage of sometimes than callous to the needs of others. What I really needed was to maintain boundaries, and to acknowledge when someone is beyond my help, not to not be kind
First person you have to be kind to is yourself
Being kind and being a doormat are not the same thing.
I can think of a couple acts of kindness I'd probably not repeat. But generally I try to be kind anyway.
I've regretted once act of cruelty. I once helped a stranded student get back to his country. It was, of course, a scam. A fairly elaborate one, including remote co-conspirators etc, but a scam nonetheless.
i'd just be impressed they went through all that trouble for a plane ticket
Obviously it wasn't for a plane ticket. They were just scamming helpful people, which was the worst part.
oooh, i read this as "somehow at the airport accosted me with sob story until i bought em a flight home"
I'm curious if this was a Lemmy user/scammer
Nah. Way before lemmy . It was in meatspace
- I regret every time I’ve been idle in the face of cruelty.
Try not to let selective memory mess ya up; a majority of your kindness is likely forgotten (saying thank you, watching someone's bag while they are away five minutes, etc) until you get the one time it backfires. Rare events, especially negative ones, have high salience.
Cruel impulsives, on the other hand, you tend to remember when you were driven to a rage or when you shouted at someone you love. Impulses you should regret but do happen to normative people.
Unless you're a terrible person, anyway, then these are reversed. Common cruelty and rare kindness aren't default human behavior because it's counter to tribal survival and evolution would just kill you off. That behavior usually the result of something like a toxic culture or upbringing, and very occasionally psychosis.
Perhaps this person has never experienced abandonment or betrayal.
Only thing of kindness i kind of regretted was loaning a 50 for a friend. I was student back then and it was a big money at the time. That friend started to evade me and pretty soon it got clear they did not have any plan to pay to me.
I was angry at the time, but now later in life hearing what kind of people he spends his time with, im glad he kept his distance. Now i consider that fifty as a good investment.
I have regretted being kind to someone who turned out to be an evil piece of shit.
"I really shoulda let the door hit Elon that one time instead of grabbing it."
You shouldn't.
It's easy to be kind to pleasant people. There's no virtue in that.
Sorry; I ain't Jesus. I'm not able to turn the other cheek when I'm slapped in the face. 😔
- It doesn't take being Jesus to hold a door for someone.
- You did the right thing holding that door, the regret is a flaw for you to work on, whether you're willing to admit it or not.
we have all been too kind to nazis, and now we live in a fascist shithole country