What Nice People Regret As They Die

Welcome to Shrink for the Shy Guy. This is the show for you. If you are sick and tired of being held back by fear, self doubt, social anxiety, shyness, anything that's stopping you from you being you. I'm going to share the most powerful tools and resources that I've been discovering over the last 15 years on my journey to eradicate social anxiety and instill confidence, first in myself and then in every single person that I meet on my journey. You're going to learn these tools and how to apply them in your life now so that you can become the most free, powerful, bold, authentic version of you. Welcome to today's episode of the show. Today we're going to be talking about what you might be regretting as. As you die. Yay. But I know that might not sound like what you want to listen to, but trust me, this is going to be one of the most valuable episodes that you've probably ever listened to in your life, and certainly of this show. Because this is a game changer. When you really get this and you actually let this information inform how you live, it can change everything for you. And what we're specifically looking at is what nice people regret as they die. Now, this also turns out to be what everyone regrets as they die, but it is especially bad for nice people. And if you're really nice, you're probably going to regret this long before you die. In fact, you might be regretting it now, which might sound, again, like bad news. But there is good news, because you can change this and you can change it faster than you think. And it's very fitting that we're talking about niceness because right now we have super early bird tickets for, for my next virtual event called Not Nice Live. And that is gonna be a powerful three day, deep dive into helping you become the most bold, free, authentic version of you. Not the nice version of you, but the real and direct version of you. And we're gonna be learning that how to break free from that fear of guilt and what other people are gonna think of you for speaking up, for standing up for yourself. How to speak up and stand up for yourself. I like to get into this with this event. I like to really dive in there with people and do role plays and practice. Like, what would you say in that situation? There is so much that you can learn in these three days, and it's gonna be a powerful immersion. So as you're listening to this episode, if you're like, hey, I want to do whatever I can to steer the ship, not live with Regrets and die with regrets, but really live an authentic life that feels exciting and fully alive. Then I encourage you to come join me with the Super Early Bird ticket. Tickets are very reasonable. $97 for the full three day immersion. And it's, it's going to be something that your future self is going to thank you for. So if you would like to get your ticket, the easiest way is probably going to go to draziz.com that's-R A Z I Z.com and on that event on that page you'll see an events tab. Click the Events tab and you'll see the not nice live virtual event. Click on that and you'll be able to get your. Your ticket for the Super Early Bird rate depends on when you're listening to this. If you're listening, the super early bird rate goes for about 10 days and then it'll be a bit higher than that, but it's still absolutely worth it, even at the full price for this event. So what does this have to do with regrets? Well, we're going to talk about nice people and their regrets, but first let's talk about anyone dying in their regrets. And this is something that I reference a lot. So you maybe may have even heard me talk about this before. But it was so impactful and moving for me in my life that I tend to talk about it a lot because it really informs how I live and how I work with clients and what we're all doing here. But it comes from this woman named Bronnie Ware who was a hospice nurse and she spent a lot of time with people that were dying. And so she started to have conversations with them about their lives, their regrets, what their experience was as they came to the end of this journey, you know, before the next adventure. And she started to catalog the regrets and she came up with the top five. And she wrote a book called the five Regrets of the Dying. And I would be. If you haven't heard this before or heard me share this before, I want to ask you, what do you think the number one regret of the dying is? Is it I should have worked less? Is it I should have shared more time with those that I love? Is it I should have not, you know, I should have reconciled with my brother, my family members, and some of those are in there. The working less is definitely in there, especially for a lot of the men that she spoke with. But that's not the number one regret. The number one regret of the dying is I wish I had the courage to live a life True to myself, not the life others expected of me. I wish I'd lived a life that was true to myself, not the life that others expected of me. Now, this is basically. If we could translate this a little bit, the life that others expect of you. That's the invisible pressure of what I would call the cultural field. This is the invisible but very impactful force that is steering you in your life. It's the. It tells you what is good and bad and right and wrong and how you should be as a man and how you should be as a woman and what. What kind of milestones you should hit in your life and what's worth focusing your time and energy on and how much money you should earn and what kind of clothes you should wear and how your nose should look. And it goes on and on and on and on. And it's. It's created by the current, broader media that you take in your peer group of the people in your industry, the shows that you watch, your family, your upbringing, your culture, your religion, all these things come together to create a very long list of expectations of how you're supposed to be. And then you follow that list to be a good boy and. Or a good girl, to be okay. And then you get to the end of your life and you say, damn, I wish I had the courage to live a life true to myself. And that's. That's a common regret for everybody. But it is magnified a hundredfold for the nicest among us, because the nice people, and I know this because I lived this for many years, are terrified of challenging the cultural field. Oh, my gosh, people are gonna reject me. I'm gonna be bad. The last thing I want to be is bad. So my top priority in life is to be good, not bad. And then you get to the end of it, and you're like, damn it. I don't think that was the top priority. I think I mixed up my choices there. So there's a little write up here on the site about it that I think is very interesting. This was the most common regret of all. The wish I'd lived a life true to myself. 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 honored even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made or not made. Ouch. Like, when I. When I read that, I just felt this, like, punch in the heart. It's like, oh, not just for me, but for everybody. It's like, whoa, whoa, what are we doing here? It really invigorated my passion for this mission of mass liberation of like, wait a minute, wait a minute, let's. How many people can we save from that fate and create a whole new existence for? Because I do not know what I'll be regretting on my deathbed. I'm not going to have the hubris to say I'll regret nothing. I really don't know. I will know that I'm not going to regret living a life that was not my own because I feel like I've been practicing the bold authenticity, choosing and following and pursuing and creating and being who I want to be for many years. And I know that's not going to stop. And I want that for you too. For you to honestly say not who cares what it looks like to other people? For you to honestly say, forget your deathbed. How about right now? For you to say, you know what, look, my life's not perfect. I don't wake up every morning, just I'm so excited to be alive. Yeah. And I only feel good, positive feelings and I only feel. And I always have the best perspective and I'm always energized and I'm always upbeat and even painful stuff doesn't get me down for long. I just, I don't know what self help Kool Aid you're drinking, man, but maybe let's make this a little more realistic. Life has got ups and downs. Life has got breakthroughs and moments of victory and joy and freedom and better than you could ever think possible. And it's also got moments of pain and unexpected tragedies and hurt and loss. And we got to learn how to open our heart to all of it, to live fully. And at the same time, when you are pursuing you, that's not just your goals and your dreams, but it's also being able to speak up for yourself, being able to express yourself. By the way, guess what the number three regret of the dying was? I wish I had the courage to express my feelings. Many people suppress 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 related to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result. The first one was a punch to the heart. This one's a punch to the gut. And this isn't me telling you, here's what you should do. I'm sharing with you information that was significantly impactful for me to say how I don't want to go a day where I'm not fully expressing myself. If I got some beef or some challenge or some upset, let me share it. If there's love in my heart, let me share it while I can. Right? It's not just the bad, it's the good. It's not just the upset, it's the joy. So sharing it all. In fact, when I'm working with clients, that's really what we're doing is we're looking at. Sometimes people think like, oh, I need to speak up for myself more. I need to be able to talk about what's not working and speak to what might be, quote, negative. And I say, yeah, but for most people it's actually, let's ratchet up to the expressiveness dial. Not just one side of it, the whole dial. So you can say, hey, this is what I don't like. This is what not work. This is what's not working for me. Or you can make a choice and say, you know what, this is not working for me. I've already communicated to the person, they don't seem to be responsive. I'm going to end this, I'm going to make a change, I'm going to go over here, I'm going to do that. And you have that level of self directedness in your life, but there's also the other side. You know, how many times have you been with a friend or a loved one or someone on a date and just felt this sweet moment of joy or love or connection and you can you in that moment say, I am. I love being with you right now. This feels so good. Or depending on the depth of the relationship in the moment, you might say, wow, thank you for listening. I feel so connected with you. I love you so much. And not being like, well, how are they going to receive that? And oh, I know my brother's a little uncomfortable with that kind of direct expression. So I'm not gonna, I want to, I don't want any discomfort. Bleh. How about you just do it? Why? Because the more you avoid discomfort now, the more you will regret as you die. And that's probably, I don't know, I haven't got there yet, but I'd imagine that's a pretty intense form of discomfort to be facing these things. And probably no matter what happens before we die, there's some. Death is a process, right? It's going to grow you in a big fast way. It's going to take things away that you had as your identity. It's going to crack you open, hopefully, to spirit and something beyond the material. Hopefully. So I'm not saying it's an easy, you know. Ah, that's great. I'm done checking out. I think I won, right? Maybe. I think that's a good way to go, though. I'm gonna. I'm gonna aspire to that. Any regrets, Aziz? No. I think I won. I think I won this life. Right? So I'm not saying it's going to be a simple or easy thing. And at the same time, what would it be like to die with a full heart? To know that you just wrung every drop out of that life and really showed up and really lived. And, yes, you felt pain and you felt joy and you felt everything in between. And you truly are coming to the end with, I am so grateful the way that I live this experience. I'm so grateful for this experience. I'm so grateful for all the people that I love, and I'm so grateful for the real love that I got to experience. Because nice people don't experience real love. They experience connection, companionship, safety, security, the relationship. Real love is raw and it's real, and it's direct and it's honest, and it's all those things that when you're playing the nice person pattern, you're honestly not really doing. And again, if it sounds like I'm being judgmental or critical, trust me, everything I'm saying is coming from. It's almost like me talking to the younger version of me who was in that cage. And I compare the love that I experience now in my life with Candace, with my kids, with my family, with friends, versus what I considered love when I was younger. And it's. I mean, you could call it love, but it's a fraction of what it really could be. Because you gotta crack open the real you, right? If you have all these barriers and membranes and posturing and pretending, then even if you do have connection with people, not all of it can really get in. They don't really, really know you. And so that's the other goal, is to really let people know you in this life. And if you're willing to let people know you, if you're willing to express your feelings as they are in the moment, both the positive and the negative, if you're willing to listen to that whisper of destiny calling you to where you're meant to be and who you're meant to be and willing to take bold action towards it. And even though you will Fail and you will be rejected along the way. But you get back up and you don't stop, then I think you have a pretty damn good shot at ending your life without these regrets. And you could say, wow, what a ride. And so we want to touch on the end but not stay there. You don't have to obsessively focus on the last day of your life. You don't know when it's coming. Chill out, you got some time probably. So the question is, you touch on that and hopefully get that lightning bolt of like, oh my God, I gotta do something great. And then come back to right now and say, okay, great, how am I gonna live today? How am I. What, what ways can I express myself right now? What if I was living a life that was more true to myself? What would that even look like? So you start with even asking those questions. And then of course, if you ask those questions, things. Well, first there might be a layer of confusion. I don't know, I don't know. And maybe a layer of self judgment from your nice police. How dare you ask. How selfish of you to even ask those questions. And then there's a layer of confusion, like I don't even know what I want. I don't know. That's overwhelming. And if you're willing to be truly courageous and look, you might say, I do know and I don't think I want to stay married. I do know. And I think I need to make a major change in how I approach everybody. I need to start saying no a lot more in my life. That's my, that's my freak out sound, by the way. So what you discover might be scary, it might not be so dramatic. Who knows? But there's something there. It's a steering. And this is, this is your guidance system. You want to have access to this, right? You don't. It's like your GPS on your phone when you're driving. It's going to get you to where you want to go. You don't want to say, I don't want to look at that thing. That's, that's, that's overwhelming. I'll just drive. Okay, well then you're just going to. Where are you going to end up? Well, you're probably going to listen to whoever else is in the car with you saying, take a left, take a right. Where are you leading me? I don't know. The life you're supposed to lead. That's where I'm leading you. That's the default. That's the default. Your Car is going to go to the default your life's going to go to. So you got to pull out that guidance system, listen, have the courage to take the action. So speaking of action, I'm going to take a sip of water. Making that freak out sound is actually quite hard on the throat. Interesting side note, which has nothing to do with anything, but there's a great movie called the Descent. And I used to watch horror movies when I was younger. This was getting close to the end of my time of horror films when I made a clear and final decision to watch another horror film again because of experiences like this. But there's a movie called the Descent, and this is relevant in that it does reflect something in what I'm talking about here. Not a total tangent, just 95% tangent. And so the Descent is about a movie of these women who go spelunking, cave exploring. And it's a horror film. So, you know, something bad is going to happen. And they go down in this cave and it's already kind of freaky because they're going into these really narrow passageways and one of them almost gets stuck. Which if you have any sort of claustrophobia, you're already like, oh my God, I'm freaking out. And the bad stuff hasn't even happened yet. And then they get really, really, really deep in this cave and then the bad stuff starts happening. Which is some sort of demon bat creatures, of course. But when they flash a light and see one of these creatures, they're not just all weird and gross and pale and translucent and freaky looking with big teeth. They also make this sound. Oh, man, I think that blew out the mic. Sorry, everybody. But anyway, that's the freak out sound that you might experience when you're gonna have to make a big change in your life or a small change, but a change that is more towards you. So if you think the pursuit of authenticity is, oh, it's gonna be exciting and inspiring and energizing, yes, it will be that. And it will also be Descent demon bat creatures. Now that was a little better audio anyway, man, I was on a road trip with some friends when I watched that one. We were driving and we were spending a lot of time at campgrounds going up the coast of California up to Oregon. It was actually the first time I visited Portland and ended up living here after that. But we were. I used to live in California and we were driving up the coast and stopping at these campgrounds. It was really fun, really beautiful, just an amazing trip. But one day we went and watched a movie in the theater, the Descent. And then we went back to our campground. Freaky. I remember going out to pee in the middle of the night, just like, peeing on the edge of the forest and just looking into the darkness of the trees, and I'm just seeing these demon bat creatures. And that's why I can't do horror films. I also can't do the sound effects from horror films. It's killing my throat. I'm gonna take one more sip of water, and then we're talking about your action step. Time for action. Action, action. So your action step for today is to ask yourself this question, and this question is gonna make the whole thing a lot more manageable. So if you were 3% more courageous or you were living a life that was 3% more true to yourself, what would you do tomorrow? What I love about this question is 3% is not crazy. Right? So it's not like I'm gonna quit everything or it's just. Can you just do a little. Can you bring a little bit more? Can you be a little more expressive? Can you start to reflect a little more on what kind of work you're doing or what kind of choices you want to make? Just a little bit. So look for that 3% shift, and that is the most powerful way, because it's not overwhelming. It doesn't mean everything's gonna change tomorrow, but it starts the process in motion. And again, if you want a supercharge on this, on living your most authentic life, then definitely invite you to join me for not nice Live. It's a virtual event so you can attend from anywhere in the world. And again, the super early bird price is a fantastic opportunity to spend three days immersed, learning, not just with me, but an incredible environment of people from all over the. In fact, that's one of the biggest feedbacks I'll get from people, is, yes, your teaching was great, Aziz. So great. But. But what? No but. But being there and just seeing these people from all over the world who are intelligent and capable and. And beautiful and interesting that their challenge they're facing, this challenge, too, was one of the most beneficial or healing things I got from this. And so it is really about the community that's being created and you get to be a part of. So you can't get that from listening to this show or reading a book. You can get the information, but the information plus the connection with others, plus seeing others, plus the action steps, plus the doing it together, plus choosing. I'm going to invest three days of my life in this all leads to major changes. So if you want to make 2023 a big year where you steer towards a life that is your own, then definitely check out that event until we speak again. May have the courage to be who you are and to know on a deep level that you are awesome. Thanks for listening to Shrink for the shy guy with Dr. Aziz. If you know anyone who can benefit from what you've just heard, please let them know and send them a link to shrinkforthshyguy.com for free blogs, ebooks, and training videos related to overcoming shyness and increasing confidence, go to social confidencecenter.com it.