Do you regret having been born?

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I sure wish that many others would not have been born. Life would be so much better without them.
 
There was a long period of time when I would have answered yes.
But now that I’m back home, I can honestly say no.
No one should be deprived of the opportunity to know Jesus, and the honor of loving, rejoicing in and suffering for Him. In His light, even the darker chapters of my life have taken on an indescribable form of beauty.
I am tempted to believe that if more people truly set their lives aside and took some time every day to rest in Jesus, in addition to whatever spiritual disciplines they may or may not practice-just spend a while thinking about His love for them and allowing themselves to “rest their heads on his shoulder,” so to speak-I suspect depression rates would decease significantly.
 
Yes I do, at times more so than at other times. For me the negatives have far outweighed the positives. If that wasn’t bad enough there is always the possibility that my earthly sufferings will be magnified a zillion times and made to last forever with total constant despair as a faithful companion. I’d take non-existence any day.
 
tonyrey said:
To any extent?
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Never. Not for a second.

Life has been full of adventure and mystery from the time I was a little kid.
As someone once said, life is like a rollercoaster ride. The ride can be bumpy and the lows can put your heart in your mouth, but the view from the top is fabulous and the whole ride is exhilerating.

I’d love to do it all again!!
 
No. I’m very happy that I’m born and always have been. When I was a teen, I sometimes regreted where I was born and to whom I was born, but not the fact that I was born in the first place.
 
Borz said:
I sure wish that many others would not have been born. Life would be so much better without them.
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Perhaps there are some individuals who wish you hadn’t been born… 😉

I take it that you don’t regret being alive… at the moment anyway!
 
Allegra said:
No. I’m very happy that I’m born and always have been. When I was a teen, I sometimes regretted where I was born and to whom I was born, but not the fact that I was born in the first place.
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There are few people who can’t think of ways in which their circumstances could have been better but maturity helps us to have a sense of proportion… 🙂
 
prodigalson2011 said:
There was a long period of time when I would have answered yes.
But now that I’m back home, I can honestly say no.
No one should be deprived of the opportunity to know Jesus, and the honor of loving, rejoicing in and suffering for Him. In His light, even the darker chapters of my life have taken on an indescribable form of beauty.
I am tempted to believe that if more people truly set their lives aside and took some time every day to rest in Jesus, in addition to whatever spiritual disciplines they may or may not practice-just spend a while thinking about His love for them and allowing themselves to “rest their heads on his shoulder,” so to speak-I suspect depression rates would decease significantly.
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To live in a spiritual desert is to “tempt Providence”!
 
Robertanthony said:
Yes I do, at times more so than at other times. For me the negatives have far outweighed the positives. If that wasn’t bad enough there is always the possibility that my earthly sufferings will be magnified a zillion times and made to last forever with total constant despair as a faithful companion. I’d take non-existence any day.
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Have the negatives always outweighed the positives?
 
John21652 said:
Never. Not for a second.

Life has been full of adventure and mystery from the time I was a little kid.
As someone once said, life is like a roller-coaster ride. The ride can be bumpy and the lows can put your heart in your mouth, but the view from the top is fabulous and the whole ride is exhilarating.

I’d love to do it all again!!
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That’s the way it should be. 🙂
 
I don’t have anything on which to base having not been born…so I don’t know what the alternative would have involved. Has life been predictable, easy, free of struggle? No. Would I do it over again if I had the opportunity? Only if I knew that going through it meant that I would be born again into an eternity of peace and happiness, as I have hope in through the saving Grace of Jesus Christ and the Sacraments of the Catholic Church which is what I have been given by being born…😃
 
Honestly, yes.

According to the use of reason, if God does not exist or there is no afterlife, the greatest possible “sin” (based on the use of reason, if one thinks suffering is bad and should be avoided), is to bring forth more suffering (life) in to the world (as every life contains a non-zero amount of suffering). Non-existence is better than existence, according to non-Theistic premises, as the privation of happiness is not an intrinsic evil, but the experience of suffering is: not to exist is to be deprived of happiness, whereas to exist is to suffer: thus, non-existence is more felicitous than existence).

Even though the position itself (procreation is an intrinsic evil/voluntary extinction) is verboten even amongst secular atheists, which is another instance of their denial of reason). Another instance of my, based on the presuppositions I held at the time, following the argument wherever it may lead.

One of my favorite books for quite a while was Better Never to Have Been: the Harm of Coming in to Existence (a 250-page impeccably reasoned defense of the matter, including refutations of rebuttals) by an atheistic ethical utilitarian, David Benatar. And I am quite a fan of Schopenhauer.
 
Maureen_Brilla said:
I don’t have anything on which to base having not been born…so I don’t know what the alternative would have involved. Has life been predictable, easy, free of struggle? No. Would I do it over again if I had the opportunity? Only if I knew that going through it meant that I would be born again into an eternity of peace and happiness, as I have hope in through the saving Grace of Jesus Christ and the Sacraments of the Catholic Church which is what I have been given by being born…😃
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In my opinion a life without any hope is irrational.
 
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