610: A Letter to My Kids (My Biggest Regrets)
Achieve Your Goals with Hal Elrod
Hal Elrod
4.8 • 1.4K Ratings
🗓️ 5 November 2025
⏱️ 21 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Feelings of regret can be one of life's heaviest burdens. I'm sure most people have choices and decisions that they've regretted in their lives, and I'm no different. But what I've learned is that regret doesn't have to be a source of suffering; it can be one of our greatest teachers if we let it.
In today's episode, I thought I'd share a very personal letter that I recently wrote to my kids about the biggest regrets of my life. Things like all the precious moments that I've missed that I'll never get back, and moving away from loved ones I wish I'd stayed close to. These are the lessons that taught me that family and loved ones should always come first, no matter what.
Ultimately, this episode is about learning to release the weight of regret and transform it into wisdom. We can't change the past, but we can use it to shape a more intentional, love-centered future. My hope is that you'll reflect on your own life, forgive yourself for what you can't undo, learn from it, and make different choices moving forward. This way, when you look back on your life, you won't be reliving the past; you'll look back fondly on what matters most.
P.S. My newest book, The Miracle Morning After 50: A Proven Path to Joy, Vitality, and Purpose for Aging Adults, co-authored with Dwayne J. Clark, is now available for pre-order at MiracleMorningafter50.com. If you're over 50—or have a loved one who is—this book will help to live with purpose and joy in the second half of life.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- How Regret Can Be a Powerful Teacher If We Accept It
- The Importance of Choosing Family and Loved Ones First
- Why Being Present Matters More Than Money or Promotions
- How to Let Go of the Past and Turn Regret Into Wisdom
- Create a Life You'll Never Look Back on With Regret
Get The Full Show Notes
To get full access to today's show notes, including audio, transcript, and links to all the resources mentioned, visit MiracleMorning.com/610
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to the Achieve Your Goals podcast, the show that empowers you to wake up to your full potential and achieve your biggest goals and dreams. |
| 0:09.6 | I am your host, Hal Elrod, and I invite you to join us each week as we share actionable strategies to take your life to the next level, |
| 0:16.5 | as well as interview world-class experts and entrepreneurs who have achieved extraordinary goals |
| 0:21.9 | themselves and we ask them to give you a peek behind the curtain and teach you exactly what |
| 0:26.3 | you need to do to do the same. Ready? Here we go. |
| 0:34.3 | Hello friends. Welcome to the Achieve Your Goals podcast. This is Hal Elrod. And today we're talking about |
| 0:41.1 | regret and living your life in a way where regret serves you. It doesn't hurt you. It doesn't cause you to |
| 0:48.9 | suffer. It doesn't cause you to beat yourself up. It doesn't cause you to live in the past. Regret can really hurt us. |
| 0:56.1 | In fact, it can be like that heavy backpack that you carry through your entire life and you don't |
| 1:01.9 | realize that you can set the backpack down. What's inspiring today's episode is, well, number one, |
| 1:08.1 | last week, our episode was like 15 minutes. It was a much shorter than |
| 1:12.0 | usual podcast episode. And I got some great feedback. They're like, that was great. It's nice to have |
| 1:16.1 | instead of like a 45 minute or 60 minute podcast, some shorter episodes. So I thought, you know what, |
| 1:21.6 | let's keep it fresh and do that again. And specifically, though, what inspired the episode is a letter |
| 1:27.2 | that I wrote to |
| 1:28.0 | my kids about my biggest regrets. So I am going to read you this letter and then we'll unpack it |
| 1:36.0 | and apply it to your life. So it says, dear Sophia and Halston, there are a few things I've been |
| 1:43.1 | carrying in my heart for a long time |
| 1:44.9 | that I want to share with you. They're my biggest regrets, mistakes I've made that I can't undo. |
| 1:51.1 | My hope in sharing them isn't to make you sad, but to help you learn from my experiences so that you |
| 1:56.9 | don't repeat them. Life has a way of teaching us through both our joys and our mistakes, |
| 2:02.9 | our wins and our failures. Regret, when we use it the right way, can be one of life's greatest |
... |
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