Keep Death Close
The top five regrets of the dying, read every day, before you need a near-death experience to hear them.
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~ongoing to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 86%
Nemtin names this as his secret to profiting in life: thinking about your death. He anchors on Cornell research that 76% of people reach their deathbed with the same number one regret — I wish I would have lived my ideal self, the life I wanted, not what others wanted for me. The full top five are: lived for me, told people how I really felt, worked less, let myself be happier, stayed in touch with my friends. None concern money. His test is the eulogy: at a friend's funeral you don't talk about their wealth or success, you talk about them being a good friend and the values they embodied. The practice is daily proximity to mortality so time reads as finite and you live with intention — without waiting for the trauma that would deliver the same lesson too late.
Origin
The whole Buried Life project began when Nemtin and his friends stumbled by accident onto the question 'what do you want to do before you die,' and found that thinking about death made them think about life. Over the following decade of speaking he encountered the Cornell research on deathbed regret, and the 76% figure became the engine of his work — the reason he speaks at all is to move more people into the minority who actually go after things.
Core principles
- 0176% of people reach their deathbed regretting the things they didn't do, not the things they did.
- 02The number one deathbed regret is having lived for others' expectations rather than for yourself.
- 03The five regrets of the dying have almost nothing to do with money or success.
- 04You should not need a trauma to gain the perspective a trauma gives.
- 05Time is finite; remembering that daily is what produces living with intention.
How to run it
- 1
Read the five regrets
The top five regrets of the dying: I wish I would have lived for me; I wish I would have told people how I really felt; I wish I would have worked less; I wish I would have let myself be happier; I wish I would have stayed in touch with my friends.
Pro tip Note what is absent. None of the five concern money or success. Yes you want to make money, yes you want to be successful — but that is not what the list contains.
- 2
Run the eulogy test
When you give a eulogy for a friend, you don't talk about how much money they had or how successful they were. You talk about them being a good friend and the values they embodied. Ask what yours would say.
- 3
Break the immunity illusion
When you see a 90-year-old with a cane hunched over shuffling down the street, you never think that's going to be you. It's the only thing you can count on. Best case scenario is another 50 years; you might die in a week.
Watch out The illusion that time is abundant is the whole mechanism by which deferral happens. It doesn't feel like a belief — it feels like the background.
- 4
Get the perspective without the trauma
People say 'I had a near-death experience and everything changed' or 'my dad died and everything changed.' Nemtin's question: why does it take a traumatic experience to wake us up, and how can you keep that perspective without going through it or without it being too late?
Pro tip The big goal is to remind yourself every day that this could be your last. It sounds cliché — Nemtin says so himself — but it's the truth.
- 5
Start now
The biggest regret people have is wishing they'd done the things they didn't do. So start. A year from now you'll wish you started today.
In the wild
Nemtin's central statistic: research from Cornell finds that 76% of people on their deathbed share the same number one regret across their entire life — I wish I would have lived my ideal self, the life I wanted, not what others wanted for me or what I thought I should do. It is the reason he became a speaker rather than staying at the production company he founded with the Buried Life crew.
→ He built the Bucket List Journal explicitly to solve that problem — identify the goals, build accountability, build inspiration through action, move through the fear, so you don't end up on your deathbed regretting the things you didn't do.
Nemtin's illustration of the immunity illusion: you see a 90-year-old with a cane, hunched over, shuffling down the street, and you never think that's going to be you. You don't even think about it. But the only thing you can count on is that it will be you — best case scenario.
→ The reframe converts an abstract truth into a felt one, which is what produces living with intention rather than deferral.
Common mistakes
Waiting for the wake-up call
People report that a near-death experience or a parent's death changed everything. The lesson is available without the trauma — and waiting for it means paying the price of the trauma and losing the years before it arrived.
Optimising for what the regrets don't mention
None of the top five regrets concern money or success, yet those are what most people spend their finite time maximising. Nemtin doesn't say don't pursue them — he says check them against a list that has never once included them.
Living someone else's expected route
The number one regret is living what others expected. It rarely arrives as explicit pressure from parents — it's absorbed from society as 'the expected route,' which is why it needs deliberate reflection to detect.
Is it for you?
Best for
Successful people optimising hard for career and money who have never audited whether the target is theirs.
Not ideal for
Anyone for whom sustained mortality focus would worsen existing anxiety rather than clarify priorities.
From the transcript
“76% of the population, their biggest regret on their deathbed is I wish I would have lived for me, not what others expected of me.”
“You need to remember that your time is finite to put things in perspective.”
“Why does it take a traumatic experience to wake us up? How can you keep that perspective without going through that trauma or without it…”
“Start now. A year from now you'll wish you started today. That's the truth.”
From the episode
Ben Nemtin: Badass Bucket Lists
Ben Nemtin