Quick Summary:
- Being fully alive means embracing discomfort and allowing yourself to be “thrown from the nest” repeatedly and living life without regret – it’s about choosing the unpredictable aliveness of growth over the predictable deadness of your comfort zone.
- To live life without regrets, you must wake up to your true desires and commit to staying awake – this means catching yourself when you go back to sleep and recommitting to your aliveness daily through simple practices like calendar alerts and “small rebellions.”
- The secret to live life without regret is enjoying your life RIGHT NOW – not waiting for perfect conditions but finding radical joy in everyday moments, from dancing badly in your kitchen to crying over the perfection of fresh corn.
Are you living your life fully alive? Do you feel joyful, free, on FIRE for life?
Or are you going through the motions? Getting up every day and thinking that fully on fire “oh hell yes” feeling is:
- Make believe
- For other people
- Some “think positive bullsh!t”
- Something you have to work hard and earn first
- Something that “sounds nice” but isn’t real
Yet maybe you find yourself up at night thinking… “what if?”
Knowing deep in your bones that anything is possible for you. That you can have anything you want. But somehow it’s all just been slightly out of reach.
You get some of what you want, yet you find yourself sort of settling and saying “maybe this is enough. I don’t want to be greedy.”
You start to feel really good, but then find yourself with chaos swirling around you instead of the calm, playful, relaxed feeling you’re seeking.
You wake up 2 months (or 2 years) later, asking yourself:
“Where has the time gone? What have I been doing?” realizing that you’ve been living down the rabbit hole of “managing stress” by binging Netflix and doom-scrolling social media.
Yikes.
To live life without regret, you have to be willing to confront the uncomfortable truth about being fully ALIVE.
The Uncomfortable Truth About Being Fully Alive
Being fully alive is uncomfortable as f**k. Because it requires you to take risks, to take leaps, to go and be the balls-to-the-walls badass who knows she has wings that you REALLY are.
“To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest.”
- Pema Chödrön
Your Nervous System Wants You To Stay Asleep
Your nervous system HATES this being thrown out of the nest. It hates being uncomfortable.
Your subconscious mind thinks comfort zone equals survival (and when your survival feels like it’s on the line – your nervous system freaks out and says “oh hell no, we’re not going THERE!).
It literally believes that predictable deadness is safer than unpredictable aliveness.
We ALL go to sleep. Again and again. To who we truly are. To what we really want. To the radical, unapologetic HELL YES life that’s actually available to us.
The wild thing is that we do this ON PURPOSE. Because at least “dead” is predictable, right? At least “dead” and numbed out is inside our comfort zone.
The sad thing? Society teaches you this!
Our society profits on keeping you separated from your most powerful self.
Our culture literally teaches you to just go through the motions and live life half alive.
Why? Because then you can be more easily controlled by the fear narrative instead of owning your power.
I felt this when I woke up in my “looks good on paper” life where I had the nice fiancé, owned a home, was a successful psychologist, all the things that were supposed to make me happy and realized “I’m not happy. I’m comfortably numb.”
I ticked all the boxes. Did all the stuff I was supposed to do. And felt so diminished and dull.
If I had continued down that path, I never would have learned how to live life without regret.
“Think of yourself as dead. You have lived your life. Now, take what’s left and live it properly.”
- Marcus Aurelius
This ancient wisdom reminds us that to live life without regret, we must live with fierce intention, as if we’ve been given a second chance at life itself.
The Pattern of Going Back to Sleep
I left that comfortably numb life behind and began the adventure of a lifetime.
I developed one of my core philosophies “Live Life Without Regret”
Even the decisions that seemed crazy pants, or ended up in absolute failure, I embraced as pages in an intricate story that more deeply expressed who I truly am.
I lived off grid on an organic farm in Hawaii. I moved to Bali. Started my own business over a decade ago.
Yet, I still found that I could fall prey to going back to sleep.
Years ago, years after leaving that life behind I still found that pattern was playing itself out again in my life. I did mushrooms and found myself naked, crying, and I kept repeating “I don’t want to be dead anymore. I want to be fully ALIVE!”
Like many of the wake-up calls I’d had before, I realized: “Holy sh!t. I keep choosing to go back to sleep.”
(Spoiler: You probably do too. And that’s okay. Once you realize you’re doing it, you can choose something different!)
Here’s the thing – the point isn’t perfection. It’s not about never going back to sleep. It’s about waking up FASTER each time. It’s about choosing aliveness. Reminding yourself of your aliveness. Recommitting to your aliveness every day.
The Portal To Live Life Without Regret That Nobody Talks About
Here’s the thing about that radical aliveness you crave. To live life without regret…
Enjoying the shit out of your life IS the portal.
Not when you lose the weight.
Not when you make the money.
Not when you finally feel “ready.”
RIGHT NOW.
With the messy kitchen and the weird relationship with your mother, and the job that makes you want to fake your own death every Monday.
You get to have it all. The love. The money. The impact. Everything you’ve been chasing while half-asleep.
But here’s what nobody tells you – to live life without regret means being willing to look absolutely ridiculous in pursuit of feeling ALIVE. To buck the need for permission, or approval, or other people’s accolades.
And instead, just to do it for the pure pleasure and joy of being that ecstatic about each moment.
Like when I dance in my kitchen to 90s hip hop while making breakfast. (Yes, I know all the lyrics to “Bust a Move.” No, I’m not good at it. That’s not the point.)
Or that time I was on a podcast years ago and told the interviewer I cried the last time I ate fresh corn on the cob. He asked “Were you drunk?” and I said, “No, I was just so in love with that moment and experience, I cried out of gratitude for it.”
This is what true aliveness looks like.
This is when you’re in radical alignment with your inner being, with your authentic self, with the ultimate truth that leads to everything you desire.
When you not only feel a wink from the universe, you give it to yourself in buckets with a sneaky smile. A little giggle at an inside joke in your head. A wink in the mirror. A side-eyed glance that acknowledges how awesome you are that no one else is in on.
That’s when you’re magnetic. When you’re electric. When you’re living life ON FIRE and in full alignment with who you really are.
How to Live Life Without Regrets: 5 Steps to Take Today
If you’re wondering “yeah, but how the heck do I actually DO that? Try starting with these 5 steps.
1. The Radical Calendar Cleanse + Daily Aliveness Commitment
Cancel ONE soul-sucking obligation on your calendar. That thing that makes you want to die inside? It’s gotta go.
Replace it with a daily aliveness reminder. Set a phone alarm that says “I AM FULLY ALIVE” or put “RADICAL JOY CHECK-IN” on your calendar.
This literally rewires your nervous system to expect joy instead of dread.
Action: Do it now. Open your calendar. Find the thing. Delete it. Replace it with your aliveness reminder.
2. The Daily Giggle – Small Rebellions
Remember that sneaky smile, that little giggle at an inside joke in your head? That’s your aliveness peeking through.
To live life without regret, you need daily “small rebellions” that make you giggle nervously.
- Wear mismatched socks to your serious meeting
- Order dessert for breakfast
- Text someone “I think you’re amazing” out of the blue
- Skip instead of walk for 10 seconds
Action: Choose one small rebellion for tomorrow. Something that makes you think “I can’t possibly!”
Perfect. Do that.
3. The Sensual Feast
Remember my corn story? That’s what eating like it’s foreplay with the universe looks like. To live life without regret means being present enough to let a perfectly ripe peach make you moan.
Stop eating at your desk while answering emails. Stop treating food like “it’s just fuel”. Start treating it like the love letter from earth that it is.
Action: Your next meal, take one bite with your eyes closed. Really taste it. Let yourself make sounds. Yes, even if people are watching.
This is actually a version of mindfulness meditation that you can practice in like 5 seconds a day.
If you’ve ever thought “I can’t meditate” well here’s your wakeup call. You can. Now go try it out!
4. The Truth Experiment
Most of the “5 regrets of the dying” come from what people didn’t say or didn’t do because they were afraid.
To live life without regret, start with tiny truths and build up.
- “Actually, I hate quinoa”
- “That meeting could have been an email”
- “I’m not fine, I’m struggling”
- “I love you and I’m scared to say it”
Action: Tell one tiny truth today. Start small. Work your way up to the big ones.
5. The Bad Dancing Prescription
Dancing badly ON PURPOSE tells your nervous system that play equals safety. That it’s okay to be bad at things. That it’s okay to look ridiculous. That it’s actually FUN to be spectacularly bad at something!
It literally rewires your brain to associate joy and silliness with security instead of rigidity with safety.
This is how you live life without regret – by being more committed to feeling alive than looking cool.
Action: Put on one song tonight. Dance like you’re alone. Because you are. And because your cells want to remember they’re made of stardust.
The Bottom Line: Be So Alive Others Remember They’re Alive Too
Bronnie Ware’s research on “The 5 Regrets of the Dying” revealed that people’s biggest regrets were:
- Living life based on others’ expectations instead of being true to themselves
- Working too hard and missing life
- Not expressing their feelings
- Losing touch with friends
- Not letting themselves be happier
Every single one comes from choosing safety over aliveness.
From going to sleep to what they really wanted.
To live life without regret isn’t about doing everything. It’s about being awake enough to choose YOUR things. The things that make you come alive.
When you’re so on fire for life that people warm themselves in your glow, you give them permission to wake up too.
Your aliveness becomes contagious. Your joy becomes revolutionary.
Because the truth is, you are. You are a revolutionary and just by being your most authentic joyful playful relaxed self you revolutionize everything around you!
Commonly Asked Questions
What does it mean to be fully alive?
Being fully alive means experiencing each moment with presence and joy, allowing yourself to be “thrown from the nest” repeatedly as Pema Chödrön describes.
It’s choosing discomfort of growth over the deadness of your comfort zone, and finding radical joy in everyday moments – from dancing badly in your kitchen to crying over perfect corn.
Why is living life without regret important?
Research on “The 5 Regrets of the Dying” shows that people’s biggest deathbed regrets all stem from choosing safety over authenticity.
To live life without regret means you won’t reach your final days wishing you’d been braver, expressed your feelings, or allowed yourself more joy.
It’s about making choices now that your future self will thank you for.
How do I know if I’m “going back to sleep”?
You’re going back to sleep when you find yourself doom-scrolling instead of creating, numbing out with Netflix instead of having hard conversations, or saying “maybe this is enough” when your soul is screaming for more.
Another key factor? When you feel completely unplugged from your emotions.
[Listen to the Podcast about how your emotions are key to manifesting what you most deeply desire]
The key signs: you’re managing stress instead of experiencing joy, and time passes without you noticing.
What if my nervous system freaks out when I try to change?
Your nervous system is wired to see comfort as safety, which is why change feels scary.
Start with “small rebellions” that make you giggle – these teach your nervous system that aliveness is safe.
Set daily reminders to choose joy. Dance badly on purpose. These practices literally rewire your brain to associate pleasure with safety.
How can I live life without regrets when I have responsibilities?
To live life without regret doesn’t mean abandoning your responsibilities – it means bringing aliveness TO them.
It’s moaning over your lunch salad, having a dance break between Zoom calls, or wearing bright orange lipstick to the PTA meeting.
It’s about infusing radical joy into the life you already have while making brave choices about what truly deserves your energy.
Ready to unpack that sparkly ass and blind some people with your shine? The world needs your particular brand of aliveness. Stop hiding it. Start living it.
And enjoy the SHIT out of every second.
