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What is the first experience you remember? Certainly that memory is tinged with nostalgia and viewed in soft focus, but it is indicative of how ubiquitous experiences are. When was the first time that you experienced remorse or regret? Can you remember? More often than not, your first experience was impressionable but impermanent--considerably less permanent than your most recent experience with remorse.

I'm reminded of this by an experience I had this weekend while visiting friends. My wife had brought along some food to contribute to our hosts' offerings, and we all ate together. All the food was delicious, and all adults thoroughly enjoyed.

Our friends' six-year old son, however, was not hungry and was eager to be excused from the table. First he said he was full; then, in a second effort, he pointed out the food on his plate which he didn't like. He went to great detail to explain why he did not like these foods, completely unaware that his objects of distaste were our offerings.

Naturally, the parents were mortified, but we took it in stride and gave it no bearing. I did, however, reveal the whole thing to the little guy to see what he would do. He is rather fond of me, so I curtly interrupted him and said, "Hey! I made that food!"

He froze. His look was remarkable; it was the exact expression of adult remorse, here on this sweet kid's face. Though no one had done anything particularly wrong, it was evident that he regretted his comments. Full realization at such a young age!

Of course I hadn't prepared the food; my wife had. And he looked at me for some telltale sign that I was pulling his leg. I gave none. Finally his father broke the uneasy stalemate with a mild reprimand and a brief lecture on the feelings of others. I of course was immediately lost in thought, recalling my observations of my little friend during the episode. For how often do we feel remorse? Probably more often than we think. And now that we are adults, administrators, designers, managers and developers, our remorse may be the result of a much more noticeable faux pas. An email sent without a title, an appointment not met, a document not saved, a website not proofread or untested in various browsers or a user's unintentional selection on that page can evoke feelings of regret, remorse, and anxiety.

Bad experiences are experiences too; we simply try to minimize them. At Content Greenhouse our goal is to make every experience a deliberate action. Our good experiences should outweigh our negative ones, and those negative experiences we face should automatically point us to a better experience in a positive yet reinforcing way.