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Creativity Quote by Natalie Cole

"I've had my share of doing things that I really wish I hadn't done"

About this Quote

There’s a disarming plainness to Natalie Cole’s line: no poetic veil, no diva melodrama, just the weary arithmetic of regret. “My share” is doing a lot of work. It frames wrongdoing not as a singular fall from grace but as a portioned-out human experience, the kind you accumulate when the spotlight and the after-hours are always on. It’s confession without spectacle, accountability without self-flagellation.

The phrase “doing things” stays deliberately vague, which is precisely why it lands. Cole doesn’t ask the listener to rubberneck at details; she invites recognition. That vagueness is also a control move. In a culture that turns celebrity pain into tabloid inventory, she keeps ownership of her narrative by refusing to itemize it. The emotional truth is the point, not the receipts.

Context matters: Cole’s life was famously bifurcated between immense musical inheritance (Nat King Cole’s daughter, a voice that could summon both reverence and comparison) and very public struggles, including addiction and recovery. Read through that lens, the sentence becomes a compact survival statement. It acknowledges harm without collapsing into it, implying a before and after: there were choices, there were consequences, and there is a self now capable of naming them.

What makes it work is its modesty. Regret here isn’t branded as a comeback arc; it’s presented as lived experience. The subtext: you can be talented, adored, and still messy - and you don’t need to glamorize the mess to prove you’ve grown past it.

Quote Details

TopicLearning from Mistakes
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Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Cole, Natalie. (2026, January 16). I've had my share of doing things that I really wish I hadn't done. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ive-had-my-share-of-doing-things-that-i-really-123766/

Chicago Style
Cole, Natalie. "I've had my share of doing things that I really wish I hadn't done." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ive-had-my-share-of-doing-things-that-i-really-123766/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"I've had my share of doing things that I really wish I hadn't done." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ive-had-my-share-of-doing-things-that-i-really-123766/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.

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I Have Had My Share of Doing Things I Really Wish I Had Not Done - Natalie Cole
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About the Author

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Natalie Cole (February 6, 1950 - December 31, 2015) was a Musician from USA.

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