What It Means to Have No Regrets

The other night I watched a video of a man who had two weeks left to live—a successful lawyer who had finally reached the pinnacle of his career, having just recently been chosen as senior partner of his firm. Yet there he sat at the edge of his bed, tubes in his nose, full of sorrow and regret, confessing that the title he had once worshiped now felt hollow. The wealth, prestige, and status he had accumulated seemed totally irrelevant. He had spent his entire adult life climbing, competing, proving—only to arrive at the summit and realize there was nothing there. His greatest regret was that he had never truly lived, having sacrificed his family and rarely spending time with his wife and daughter.

I turned off the screen and sat for a while. His despair and anguish were palpable, poignant, and heartbreaking, and I felt deep sadness and sympathy for him. At the same time, I felt a strange calmness, an inner peace almost. I have spent over a decade excavating my past, gathering the fragments of memory and pain, and shaping them into something coherent and meaningful: a legacy memoir born of truth-telling, self-discovery, and healing. In completing it, I feel as though I have traced the arc not only of my own journey but also of my ancestors'—their disconnection, emotional pain, and scars that never healed.

Through writing, I have done what generations before me could not: I have named their unspoken grief, turned shame and stigma into language, and chosen to stop passing it down. That, to me, is legacy and a healing that ripples across time. My work may never make me famous, but it may help someone feel seen, less alone, more understood.

So when I think, If I were to die tomorrow, would I have regrets? the answer is a clear no. Because I have loved and lived fully, and gave it all I had to make my life experiences useful for others. I have created something that can outlast me and, more importantly, bring light where once there was darkness. That is enough for me to be able to say I have no regrets.

Writing the Memoir

How I wrote the book; how long it took; why I wanted to tell the story; and what I'm hoping the book does for its audience

My writing background had been primarily academic, and I'd initially struggled with creating writing. But after participating in several weeklong "Freefall Writing" retreats in British Columbia led by Barbara Turner-Vesselago, I gradually learned to write from the higher self, free from the ego-censor. Through this method, I experienced powerful breakthroughs, and found its process very liberating and healing.

Some of the chapters in my book were adapted from pieces I'd written during those retreats that date back as early as 2007. But I didn't begin tackling my book project in earnest until 2015. In the meantime, I'd enrolled in a series of writing classes and residencies, as well as working with a writing coach.

I knew I had an important message to deliver, but this project seemed at times so enormous and overwhelming, and the process painstakingly slow and organic. It felt as if chiseling out a big marble stone little by little in order to uncover the shape of the story and zero in on its themes.

Through the process of writing this story, I came to learn that the symptoms I'd been experiencing all my life are in line with what is now called complex PTSD. This diagnosis has become more widely known in recent years, with neuroscience studies pointing out that prolonged adverse early childhood experience (emotional neglect in my case) can negatively affect the trajectory of an entire life by fundamentally altering the architecture of the developing brain (thus making the individual more susceptible to stress). With this realization, I felt validated for what I'd gone through as a child, and liberated to realize that my struggle wasn't my fault. This understanding helped to heal many of my childhood wounds and to find a way forward by practicing self-care and self-compassion.

I hope this book will help people with similar struggles feel less alone, and find hope and inspiration in their healing journeys.