How Can Death Help Your Business?
September 22, 2007
Death is probably one of my biggest motivators. The reason is simple. You never know when it’s going to happen, but you do know that when it does, any plans you had for the future will be gone.
Did you ever wonder what people regret most, when they’re lying on their deathbeds? Elizabeth Kubler-Ross knew the answer. She worked with dying patients for many years, and wrote several books on the subject.
Her most inspirational book was Life Lessons. And in it she said that most patients she cared for, when they were on their deathbeds, did not regret the things they had done. In fact, they regretted all the things they hadn’t done.
And you’ll probably realise, there is a huge benefit to knowing this. Is there something you’ve always wanted to do, but you’ve been too afraid? Perhaps you’ve wanted to go into business for yourself full-time, but you keep putting it off until a better time.
The trouble is, a better time may never come. So, don’t keep putting off the things you really want to do, or you may never get round to them. And you don’t want to be lying on your deathbed regretting the things you didn’t do.
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That is very true…However, you shouldn’t think about death every time you want to get motivated! LOL
I think we should worry about living life instead of death…not good to think about death all the time, it can be very depressing.
This is a lovely and motivating post Cath, but heck..you are talking a bit too often about death…
Thanks for the good read Catherine.
Well, I haven’t been reading too long to scold you for talking about death.
Good reminder. Perhaps even timely, in my case. Thanks.
I definitely live by this. It always puts everything in perspective.
I think this is by far the single most idea that really allows you to really fulfill your potential. You can see it in many successful people such as Steve Jobs (Stanford graduation speech).
Thanks for the refresher. May I be even bolder in my pursuit!
Death and re-birth are powerful images and concepts. You can be alive but dead inside.
I was.
I feel re-born having gone through a business near-death experience.
Well not entirely true - the old one died, but the new one is helping me live again and look up and see the important things I’d been missing.
And cashflow aint one of those I’ve shed a tear for!
Weirdly, I think the blog I started just after the failure helped in the re-birth. Just talking about all the stuff in your head seems to make some of the horrible stuff stay on the blog and not in your mind.
It’s great to be able to “upload” all those horrible things!
Strangely, there seems to be some sort of valve which means the good stuff can be uploaded, but you get to keep hold of that.
So when I;m on my death-bed for real, I hope I can do the same - upload the illness and download the good stuff.
Not sure about blogging from your death-bed though!
This is why I like this site so much. People do not talk about a topic like death, and it is such an important topic. When my farther passed away at age 54, that was exactly the case. He regretted everything he did not do in his life. He regretted that he did not try hard to do what he wanted to do. He regretted that he compromised his passion under pressures from people around him or with his fear. Particularly people who die rather younger have this emotion. My grandmother who lived until age 91 and grandfather at 89 were satisfied with there lives. We never know when it happens to us. We can have a traffic accident tomorrow. We should definitely live in the way we would not regret if that happens to us tomorrow.
Carl - I haven’t read the Steve Jobs graduation speech but I’m definitely going to read it now.
Ian - it definitely does make you feel better to write down all the bad stuff. I used to do that every morning when I was going through a bad time (not on a blog, just on pc) and it really does make you feel better doesn’t it - to get it out of your system?
Asako - that is interesting that those who live much longer don’t have as many regrets. Mind you 91 is pretty old - you can fit a lot into that amount of time.
I think living until I was really old and being bored and alone scares me too. And you see a lot of old people like that. They don’t seem to be interested in achieving anything when they’re younger - then as soon as they’ve retired, they sit at home and get bored all day. It is such a waste.
Oh Thank you for reminding us Catherine
nah no worries. You can talk about death as much as you want, I just wasn’t expecting “death” in your blog (for some reason).
Catherine,
It’s good to see a post about death. Too many think they are invincible, but death happens to all of us.
Thinking and talking about death, does put our lives into perspective. Having lost many loved ones, and having gone through the grief process more times than I have wanted to, I have learned to develop an attitude of gratefulness. Gratefulness for even the smallest things.
Death and grief also taught me to leave the past, in the past, and to live each day to the fullest. You find what’s really important in life - it’s people, not “things”, it’s health, not wealth, and it’s finding joy in sharing and caring.
If you feel moved to write another post about death, I say, “You go, Girl”