Pain is a signal.
It's designed to warn us about (and help prevent) harm.
But some harm is inevitable.
Our finite lifespans mean we can't do everything, and our finite knowledge means mistakes are unavoidable.
This gives rise to a specific kind of pain: regret.
The feeling that the present could be better, if only we'd acted differently in the past.
Since regret hurts, it's tempting to try and eliminate it altogether.
But the only way to do that is to never do anything. And that's the most regrettable choice of all.
Maybe our lives are defined not by the number or size of our regrets, but the shape of them. The stories we create out of the inescapable constraints of being alive. The unique fingerprint of tradeoffs that make us who we are, for better or worse.
And maybe, once we understand this, we can finally go all-in.