Further thoughts on regrets. Part 17

Lukasz Laniecki
Nov 5 · 3 min read

Sometimes we hear someone say Do what I say, or you’re going to regret it. Or variations of it. We hear it when someone wants to force us to take a certain action / do a certain thing which is in this person’s interest. As an extortion mechanism.

Whenever we hear that we’re going to regret our choice not to do what we’re told to do we can be sure that it is an extortion mechanism and that the person who uttered such words can’t think of any better way to persuade us. Or all other methods failed.

A business person might for example say to his or her business partner “You can take it to the court of law, but I can assure you that you’re going to regret it.”, which, of course, means that the person who issued such threat (or counter-threat) is prepared to fight in a court of law and will take any measure necessary not only to win the case, but also to discredit and humiliate the other side, or turn this person’s life into a nightmare. The more serious the threat (the more painful the consequences) the better — I mean the chances that this move will work are higher if the other side really has something to fear about.

We can imagine a similar scenario between spouses who are going through a divorce. Lawyers are usually good at helping sides to a court case craft such threats.

The person who is issuing such threats (or who issued them) predicts that the person who will refuse to behave a certain way, do a certain thing, will come to regret it. Such is the wishful thinking of the person who is issuing such threats (or who already issued them). Emotions run high in such situations, so it is no wonder that this person often fails to factor in (realize) that the other side might not be the only one to suffer because of the whole thing, if the other side will choose not to yield and when it will be necessary to follow up on the threats. Oftentimes all hell breaks loose and both sides take heavy beating because of it (not only the side who issued the threat).

Usually (especially when two people fight) we can’t say for sure in advance if the decision to yield will be the best option for a given person. It can also happen that the outcome will be disastrous. This person might avoid a certain painful experience / consequence which the threatening side used in order to extort a certain behavior, but the overall net result could still be terrible for the person who yielded. Oftentimes a decision not to yield (and thus fight) will disrupt the present perception of power in a relationship. The person towards whom the threat (ultimatum) was issued will suddenly appear more powerful.

Oftentimes the choice is between two potential outcomes, neither of which seems to be actually good for us. But since we can’t think of any other option we pick one way or the other (and then we reap what we helped to sow).

If we think about it we will realize that it is the classic case of a regret. We don’t know what the outcome will be (we can only fantasize), and we can’t possibly know what all the future ramifications of a certain choice will be.

Sometimes it can even appear that losing a fight (or a court case) would be better than winning it. But we will never know. It’s still our fantasy of what would have been vs. what actually was. When we conclude that a certain move was not a good move, and that a different move would have produced better outcome, we fantasize about some dreamed-up reality. We don’t compare the actual outcome (with all its present and future ramifications) with the alternative guaranteed scenario (something which would have certainly happened had we picked B instead of A), but with something our brain came up with as a potential, preferred reality of the world.

Lukasz Laniecki

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Thinker | Writer | Artist | 100% Positivity | Zero Excuses My books 📚 http://amzn.to/2qdiu6c

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