text: why do we do what we do and regret it later?   humans work on behaviors. they are learned and just a part of our personality. what we need to learn is that we all have what we call "automatic thoughts". just use an automatic thought record. that is stop recognize the quick "automatic thought" that comes to you first when posed with a situation or conversation, think about the emotion attatched to it and then think about what you are to do next. that would be the action, what you do next. by keeping a thought record of this line of thinking, over time you will learn to catch yourself before you have a regret, be it a word that was cutting or an action. i hope that this helps. what it all boils down to is "think before you react" and understand why you feel the way you do.