On feeling sorry for people

I was rushed to leave work so my wording was a bit off.I do learn from my mistakes sometimes not the first time, like us all. Regret is pointless; things in the past, unchangeable. So rather then sitting regretting something I find out how/why it happend figure out how I can learn from it and stop it from happening again.Not saying I don't have regrets, I just don't have many. I will have more as I grow older.

Not at all. Regret is the first step.Before you can learn from your mistakes, you have to recognize that they were mistakes. You have to want to not repeat them. You have to regret making them.You don't have to stew in your regrets, but you have to have them.Without regret, there is no journey, there is no life.

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I'll take that as a Yes. I thought you assigned a great value to it. I thought these little things one does constituted "trying," which is a key point in your moral system.

Well, I will try again.I think that GOD gave all of us, including you, the ability to determine what is right or wrong.I think that also comes with a gottcha though, you are also expected to try to do what is right and to try not to do what is wrong. The point that I try to make, is that you don't have to set out to DO GOOD WORKS.Life is not big things, rather it is the sum of little things. My point is not that the little things are "trying" or moral, it is that they are easy, and should be normal. You don't try to be moral, you just try to do what is right.It really is as simple as that. Just remember I never said it was easy.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

At least you are trying, which is a feather in your cap. That's like saying, "You don't try to be moral, you just try to do what is moral."I would think that if one is moral, one does that which is moral ("right" means "moral").I conclude from the following remark that you think what I did was not right: Interpretation: "You claim . . ." [I claimed I cared but I really didn't, because I didn't do anything].The average person, reading what you wrote, would, I think, interpret the passage that way. And I think that's what you meant, despite your later protestations.I did not "try."

Hell, robin, only you can read a morality tale into that.You just plain missed a golden opportunity. That's all, You blew a chance. Whether it is moral or not has nothing to do with it just as my not eating pudding is neither moral or immoral.If there is any connection to morality it is the one YOU introduced. You claimed that your heart went out to them. Oh yeah. BFD. Your heart went out to them. Okay.Robin, you have to live with yourself, I don't have to live with you, work with you, be around you. Your morality is your own and as long as it has no negative impact on me, I really don't care what it is.I think what you did is sad. Not immoral, that will be decided by you and whoever judges you, but rather a great opportunity missed. So once again, let me ask. These folk were sitting out in a courtyard. Some had lost limbs. You say that some were poorly dressed. You were waiting for your wife to finish up whatever she was doing, so you may have had some free time. You claim your heart went out to them. Did you ask one of the staff if any of them would enjoy a conversation or visit?Maybe you feel my not eating pudding is sad. That's fine. Maybe you like pudding. If I were around you I'd likely bring you a pudding if I knew you liked it. Not as the moral thing to do, just the right thing.If you are happy with your behavior, if your behavior doesn't negatively impact someone else, I really don't care what it is. When you bring something up in a discussion though, it is then open for discussion.You introduced the story of your VA trip as an example. IIRC I responded by recounting a personal trip I made to a nursing home. That was it robin. No one said that you were not moral. Simply a counter example was posted.No one has turned all this stuff into a (five threads now? I lose track) continuing solo of "I'm a poor little petunia in an onion patch" except you. You want to keep bringing it up, likely it will keep repeating exactly the same things over and over and over and over and over again.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

quote:

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Interpretation: "You claim . . ." [I claimed I cared but I really didn't, because I didn't do anything].

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The average person, reading what you wrote, would, I think, interpret the passage that way. And I think that's what you meant, despite your later protestations.

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Now see I didn't interpret the original responses that way. I would not have gone over and talked with the veterans either and I'm a veteran. While my father was ill, I made a lot of trips to the VA Hospital.Visiting with strangers is not my strong suit. My mother is good at it, but I'm not. My father was too.Now that doesn't mean that at various times during the trips to the VA that conversations didn't happen between me and veterans I didn't know, but I didn't make a point of starting one. They happened naturally.I'm sure I've missed a lot of opportunities to visit with interesting people, but I've found I'm more helpful if I stick to my comfort zone.Jar sounds like someone who is more outgoing.IMO, the situation has nothing to do with morality, but personality.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

Very true and agree with it all.Question is: if you make that mistake/regret a positive life leason, does the regret then get dismissed? To me it does.

No, I don't think so. You have to "keep" the regret so you remember why you screwed up.For example, if you hurt somebody in the past, you should keep the regret to prevent you from hurting somebody else in a similar way in the future.It's something you have to keep working at.
Regret is a tool that should not be thrown away after one use.

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Regret and the positive aspect of what one would get out of it are intermixed, becoming something new for me. So calling it regret still is not how I see it. I will remember it, but remeber what I have learned - I look at the postive side.I don't throw it away, I morph it into a non-negative experience. Of course this doesn't always work.Lets say if I cheated on my girlfriend (didn't and will not) I can't see getting anyt positive lesson out of it. That would be a pure regret.Edited by NeuroCycle, : grammar

It was not I who thought it was a moral matter. I was giving an example of the other side of life to counter your pictures of baby birds and flowers. Some people said that my feeling itself of sympathy was immoral in that I was assuming and judging and demeaning the veterans. Others said that if I was going to be sympathetic then I ought to have done something about it. Some suggested volunteering or giving them money or whatever. Others, such as yourself, merely said that I should have talked to them.It was these posters that made a moral matter out of it, not me. I opened this thread because Mangy Tiger suggested it might be an interesting topic. This thread is not about me but about a principle, what I am calling a PC principle but which others claim is something else. Interpretation: my heart did not really go out to them. You are making this out to be a matter of personal taste, like our choice of foods, and then you say it's a matter of the "right thing.""Right," Jar, means "moral." If's it's the right thing, it's a moral matter. Personal tastes are neither right nor wrong. They are aesthetic choices. This characterization is very unfair. I used my personal experience as an example of a general idea. To do so is legitimate in argument.Edited by robinrohan, : No reason given.

Do you mean an original response such as this?

No I mean the original response in Message 226The response you provdided (Message 260) was not a direct reply to your original statement. It was a later response to subsequent posts.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

Robin, I cannot be responsible for how you interpret things. Nor can I be responsible for how you mix things up. Them's your problem.Let me give you an example. In that quote from you you pull the same stunt. What did my "pictures of birds and flowers" have to do with morality? Yet here you try to mingle the two. It's possible that your mind really does work that way, but it does seem unlikely.If other posters challenged you on the moral issue, then talk to them. I said, and I now repeat it, you missed a great opportunity. It is your loss.You also still can't see to understand what I say, so I will try yet again.I said: to which you replied:

quote:

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This characterization is very unfair. I used my personal experience as an example of a general idea. To do so is legitimate in argument.

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While I don't doubt that you feel what I said was unfair, your response has absolutely NOTHING to do with what I said. I never said you should not use personal experience in an argument. I never said what you did at the VA Hospital was immoral. I said you missed an opportunity. I said your constant stream of "Poor Little Petunia in an Onion Patch" threads is silly and that you can expect pretty much the same response every time.You do know "Poor Little Petunia" don't you? It, like "In San Francisco Bay there Lived a Whale" are great ones to sing to kids.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

You still seem to be playing games robin. You provide a quote, do not tell us who said it and provide no link back to the original so that we can see it is context and relation to earlier posts. You don't even bother to tell us which thread it was from or the message number.Makes it pretty hard to take you seriously.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion