I Know Exactly How I’ll Die (For The Most Part)

I’m praying for the latter of the two.

How I die will come down to two ways:

I’ll either regret the life I’ve lived or I won’t.

People make things too hard.

They throw in all of these factors and nuances. They account for any and everything and get so focused on the details that they can’t see big picture. Self-help does this a lot.

There are all of these “things”. You know what I mean? It’s just…too much.

There’s this and that, "don’t forget about this” and “you can only do this if you’ve done that” and “5 steps to a 10-year plan that you can manifest in 3 if you’re willing to do this in 2” and boy it’ll drive anyone insane!

“But how do I live?” I scream into the void of information. “How do I condense all of this knowledge?”.

“How do I live a life I won’t regret?”

Ahhh, and therein lies the key. There’s the purpose right there.

Sometimes when you ask the right questions you realize the answer is embedded within them.

Suddenly I realized that my question about avoiding regret is the very thing that unveils the answer about how to live:

We should live in accordance with what brings us meaning and purpose. We should live with intention instead of remaining oblivious to our existence. In essence, we should live in such a way so that we won’t regret the whole of what our lives have become by the time we reach the end of it.

Mistakes are inevitable.

I’m not saying there won’t be anything you wish you did differently, but I am saying that, by the end, I want you to be happy with what you’ve accomplished despite your mistakes.

We waste time on frivolous acts: There’s no point avoiding that which cannot be avoided. There’s no point controlling that which is outside of your control. There’s no point in balancing the forever unbalanced. There’s no point in trying to reverse the irreversible, force the worthwhile, complain to complainers, consult with those who do not wish you the best, or doubt and believe at the same time. There’s no point in attempting to create an ideal world for yourself from the things that do not and will not serve you.

I say all of this to say, please please please, stop wasting your time. You don’t even know when it will end.

You aren’t “busy”. You have a priority problem.

Like the amazing Medium writer Ayodeji Awosika told me, “I’m guessing there are a bunch of things you’re spending time on that just don’t need your attention…Prioritization is key.”

To me, living so that I don’t regret simplifies everything.

It gives me the creativity and foresight to reach my goals. It makes sense of all the ideas in my head. It declutters my mind.

When I can simply think, “Will I regret doing/not doing this?” it makes life easier and more manageable.

Suddenly, I feel like I know what I’m doing.

Suddenly, the path and system reveal themselves.

Suddenly, I am able to let go of anything that’s not important to my future self; I can now think about what my envisioned future self would do as opposed to feeling sorry for my current state.

But it’s more than that.

We think about our future all the time, don’t we? That still doesn’t always drive us to act. It’s the regret part that’s key.

It’s the idea of holding the inevitability of the unpredictable grip of death in your mind. That emotion is what ties it all together. It connects your current self to your future like no other and suddenly…you care enough to do something about it.

Emotions are everything.

The reason we don’t do the things we need to do to live the life we want to live is that we will do anything to feel good and comfortable. We will do anything to avoid pain. Success requires a level of uncomfortable living that most of us can’t stomach and aren’t accustomed to. And, we don’t even want to be accustomed to it because it’s…well, uncomfortable.

The reason we make bad decisions is also because of emotions. We are masters at repeating our mistakes because those mistakes were easier to make than it was to learn from them. Most of us humans will pick what’s easier 99% of the time.

We can’t account for our future because our future isn’t now. We want to feel good now. Screw our future selves! That’s tomorrow’s problem!

We fail to realize that when something is “tomorrow’s problem”, it will become today’s problem, which will generate more and more “tomorrow” problems. It will continue to be tomorrow’s problem over and over until that inevitable regret shows up on our deathbed, right on schedule.

Channeling your ability to be comfortable thinking about death and regret will help you to take the reins of your emotions and think about them from a different perspective.

Regret is the scariest thing ever.

My only concern as of right now is that I don’t want it badly enough. And sure, of course I do, but at the same time, clearly not enough. If I did, then I would be doing something different. That’s just me being honest. I’m trying, but sometimes I’m not really trying. I’m not beating myself up about it either though because change is hard.

What helps me is that when I think about regret, in a flash, I want it badly enough. As Eric Thomas said:

When you want to succeed as bad as you want to breathe, then you will be successful.

Wake up to the life you are living now and realize that you may not be living it in accordance with how you’ll feel in the end.

Don’t wait until the end to wish you had begun.

It’s too late then.

I’m doing my best to warn or remind you of it all now. I know that too many lie in the graveyard with wasted potential and unactualized dreams that could’ve changed the world.

Aren’t you tired of fighting yourself? Aren’t you tired of all of the commotion your inner conflict stirs within you? That same inner conflict that half-tries to live the life you want and doesn’t want at the same time?

Aren’t you tired of the chaos within? Don’t you want peace?

If so, then live with peace. Remind yourself why you are doing what you are doing and live accordingly.

One of the most profound things I ever heard came from Gary Vaynerchuk who said:

We aren’t coming back. Everyone’s walking around here like we’re coming back!

We aren’t coming back. At least not here. You either live the life you want to or you don’t.

You either remain miserable or focus on what you can control. You either continue to waste your time or stop wasting it.

Life is simpler than we make it.