During one of our coaching programmes last month, we asked a simple but confronting question: What if you could learn the most important life lessons — not at the end of your life, but right now?
Palliative care nurse Bronnie Ware spent years caring for people in their final days and noticed a striking pattern. The regrets people carried were rarely about what they had done, but about what they hadn’t done. Her reflections, first shared in a blog post and later expanded into a bestselling book, reveal a powerful truth: our time is limited, and how we choose to live matters deeply.
Below is a summary of the five most common regrets from Bronnie’s book — valuable reminders for our health, wellbeing, and the way we live every day.
Regret 1 — Living someone else’s life
Many people followed the default path — careers chosen for security, status, or to meet other people’s expectations. At the end of life, the regret wasn’t failure. It was never having truly tried.
Living by ‘shoulds’ instead of personal values created a quiet but powerful disconnect. Life looked successful on paper, but it never fully felt like theirs. This also showed up in relationships. People stayed in situations that didn’t fit — not always out of love, but from fear of hurting others, being alone, or disrupting what felt acceptable. Over time, many slowly edited themselves — dimming their personality, shelving passions, and avoiding standing out.
Then there was the ‘later’ trap. Adventures, conversations, and meaningful changes were postponed until life settled down. For many, later never came.
Regret 2 — Working too hard
For some, this meant missing their children growing up, trading presence for provision. For others, it meant tying their entire identity to work. When work became the primary source of worth, life outside of it remained underdeveloped. At the end, people didn’t wish for more success. They wished for more time, more connection, and a stronger sense of who they were beyond their role.
Regret 3 — Not expressing feelings
Many people avoided conflict to keep the peace, but in doing so, lost their voice. Important words — love, gratitude, apology — went unspoken because they assumed others already knew. But unexpressed emotion is not the same as received emotion. In some cases, relationships drifted so far that reconciliation felt impossible. One reflection echoed repeatedly: I wish I had just talked to them.
Regret 4 — Losing connection
Friendship also emerged as a powerful theme. As work, family, and routine took over, friendships slowly faded. Yet at the end of life, those relationships resurfaced in importance very quickly. What people missed wasn’t just contact, but shared history — people who knew them before the roles and responsibilities took over.
Regret 5 — Delaying happiness
Many people believed happiness would come later — when life became easier, calmer, or more successful. Others stayed in familiar unhappiness because change felt more uncomfortable than staying the same. Some simply forgot play, humour, and spontaneity altogether.
In hindsight, many realised happiness wasn’t a distant reward. It was something they needed to allow themselves to experience now.
What next?
Across all five regrets, one insight stands out. Regret is rarely about action. It is more often about delay, avoidance, and silence.
What action can you take today to avoid regret? Call an old mate? Do something that makes you laugh? Share some love or gratitude? Plan an adventure? Don’t forget that all of these things are key parts of a good health, wellbeing and fitness programme.
Neil Wagstaff is the owner of Peak Fitness in Havelock North. He has over 25 years’ experience in the health and fitness industry.
