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You only get this one precious life.
By Patrick Williams
Last updated on Mar 05, 2024
“Life can only be understood backward, but it must be lived forwards," famously said Soren Kierkegaard. None of us will get out of here alive. You do know you are going to die someday, and you hope it is a long time from now. But sometimes we live in fear of death instead of learning from it. Many different Native American tribes held a belief that death was your ally … once you befriended it, it did not haunt you but taught you about living.
So, what can we learn from those who pondered how they wished they had lived their lives when they were dying? In a blog that became a best-selling book, Bronnie Ware, an Australian nurse who spent several years in palliative care with patients in the last 12 weeks of their lives, wrote about what she learned from the dying about living. People who have reflected on their lives when they were near death have much to teach us. The Top Five Regrets of the Dying (lessons from the book by Bronnie Ware, though the notes here are mine.)
Here are 5 regrets of people on their death bed:
1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
I teach, write, and coach about this frequently and live my life with this as a compass point.
2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard
No one has ever been on their deathbed and said they wished they had worked harder.
3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings
This was truer for males more than females but it applies to all. Why do you stuff your feelings or leave them unresolved? They’re just feelings. If you ignore them, they fester and get stronger emotions, energy in motion…. etc.
4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends
Do you have people in your life you think about but don't call write or visit? Why not? Make a point to connect and you will be richer for it.
5. I wish that I had let myself be happier
The key word here is ‘let.’ Can you allow yourself to choose happiness? What do you need to confront or finish or resolve to be happy? Do it!!! If you don't, you have no one to blame but yourself.
In addition to these five, I have thought of some others as I evolved in my own life experience and coached others in theirs. I interned many decades ago in a child cancer ward with young children who were likely to die, and they taught me so much about living.
Here are the lessons I've learned:
1. Be happy now…. is what you have
Don't live in the past or get stuck in an unrealized future. The future is a plan but it is not 100% predictable. Take steps now to live with zest and enthusiasm because every day is a gift.
2. Take risks
If you always do what you do, you’ll get what you always get. The surprises in my life and greatest experiences have often come from unplanned or unexpected events that came from risking something new or different.
3. Your family and social life mean everything
Choose the people you want to be around and if they are energy drainers, choose someone else. In today’s world, you can have friends where you live, and also anywhere in the world in a robust social/virtual world online. Just choose authenticity or a social avatar that is not real.
4. Don't take yourself so seriously
Lighten up when possible. Have fun. This may be your only life. Take life seriously, but live it with the lightness of being. Have fun whenever you can, and if it’s not fun, get done with that piece and go have fun somewhere. Much of this is an attitude of curiosity and detachment from expectations.
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Dr. Pat Williams is a psychologist, Master Certified Coach, and Board Certified Coach.