As with any goal, in determining how to live a quality life, it’s important to begin with the end.

In this case, we would have to look at death. Specifically, what are the top regrets that people express on their death beds?

Luckily, an Australian palliative care nurse, Bronnie Ware, wrote the book on this topic. She recorded the wishes of many of her dying patients and wrote the book The Top Five Regrets of The Dying. Here they are:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

“This was the most common regret of all. When people realize that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made. Health brings a freedom very few realize, until they no longer have it.”

2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

“This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children’s youth and their partner’s companionship. Women also spoke of this regret, but as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence.”

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

“Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.”

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

“Often they would not truly realize the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.”

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

“This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realize until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called ‘comfort’ of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content, when deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again.”

So, how does behaving like a child solve these?

Quite simply.

Behaving like a child means doing what you want, and thus, staying true to yourself.

• Building something you believe in almost REQUIRES that same level of childishness. If Craig Kielburger hadn’t naively believed that a group of kids could put an end to child slavery around the world, they would never have built Free The Children. In fact, it’s probably only BECAUSE he still had the mentality of a child that he thought to do this.

By being a child, you aren’t “working” hard, you’re playing hard.

• Just because something is productive, doesn’t mean it has to be “work”. By playing, we often accomplish things that really matter to us. Sure, the rest of the world might look at it and think “They must have worked really hard” and sure, we might have. But a lot of the time, with the mind of a child, accomplishing things is actually done through play not work.
• If you ever watch a child-at-play for long enough, you’ll notice that they do seemingly pointless things, with absolute purpose. Children (and humans in general) actually work VERY hard. We aren’t naturally as lazy as people seem to believe.
• As a child, my brother and I once spent weeks building a fort out of logs and sticks we found around a park. We collected string, pieces of dead bark, and whatever we could find. We pressure tested that damn thing by splashing water on it, hitting it, and letting it sit through storms. Since then, the forest grew up around it, weeds took over the area, but the remnants of that fort still exist. Kids work DAMN hard because they do what they want,
• Think of the current prime minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, who might be a better example of this principle in action? Sure, he gets shit done. In fact, he’s looking to completely change the landscape of Canadian policy for the better, and so far, he’s living up to that promise. But, he knows how to have fun with his job, and that’s key. Conservative MPs try and degrade his reputation, claiming he can’t take his position seriously, but ironically, that might be exactly the reason he’s so much more successful than other party leaders. By incorporating play, and knowing to relax, he can stay emphatically passionate about his vision, without any worry of what the shit-talkers think. He can do things that the work, work, work types couldn’t imagine because he does so out of a playful passion instead of an idea of “being productive and working hard”

Happy children happily speak their mind and express their feelings

• At some point in our lives, we seem to become convinced that being honest about our feelings and opinions is more “polite”. But what’s more polite? Me lying to you, dragging you along for years, and never letting me know that I’m not interested, or me being curt and speaking my mind in a two-minute conversation that might hurt your feelings for a moment or two?
• Ironically, the former (and more “polite”) option will either lead to my being miserable until I (or you) die, or you eventually feeling betrayed when I can’t hold in my emotions anymore.
• Contrarily, the latter let us part ways and both live a little more true to ourselves, knowing that we aren’t compatible with such and such. OR it gives you an opportunity to recognize a fault in yourself and grow. At the very least, the decision is actually MADE by you and is based on truth, not a lie.
• By being honest with ourselves and others, we allow each and every one of us to grow and develop. Perhaps this is why we claim that personality is formed and set in puberty, while there is clear evidence that significant life events can completely change a personality. When we start being told we can’t express our emotions, we stop growing as a community. It gets to the point where it takes the death of a loved one for us to realize that we aren’t living true to ourselves.

For children, friends and family are always first priority.

• I still remember being a kid and leaving a video game (which I had been obsessed with at the time) to run to the door when I knew a friend was coming over. But at some point, that dedication became more focused on work. I could be in the middle of a conversation with someone I loved dearly, but thinking about what I needed to finish the next day to meet my deadline.
• Playing and being honest is the simple resolution to this distance problem. When we play or work on something we truly care about, we break down that barrier. By having a passion, we have something to share with friends. Something that is unique to us, which we can share with people that can feel our passion.

Children give themselves permission to be happy. Simple as that.

• By taking a playful approach to life, we automatically give ourselves permission to be happier. We don’t

This is a series I am working on, called letters from my younger self. Taking my personal essays that I’ve been writing since 2014. The blog posts in vitro I was too afraid to publish. I will include highlights for my hindsight 20/20 type of reflections, but the stories themselves will be largely untouched (aside from editing).