Dr. Karl Pillemer

And so with many of the people who were estranged, in permanent estrangements, I said, what can you do to find help?

They would say, I need a time machine.

I mean, I would go back.

and stop this before it occurred.

And so what you can think about is anticipatory regret, which is something psychologists talk about.

We don't just regret those things that we did, but we think about things that we might regret.

And I think that that's a key message here.

So for one example, you and your brother are having a horrible conflict and you decide never to speak to one another.

Well, that's gonna have ripple effects down to all the next generations.

Other cousins aren't gonna speak together.

There won't be family reunions.

There won't be family gatherings.

So the idea is to use anticipatory regret.

If I let this happen, will I regret it?

I think that's a very powerful way to think about these things in your family.

You grew up with your sibling.

you have strong attachment to them.

You have biologically based attachment to the people you grew up with that you can't overcome rationally.

So do you really want those to deteriorate to a point, even if it seems right in this very moment?

Let me answer it in one way, and I'm not saying this because I'm on this podcast.