I Start To Feel Uncomfortable When Everything is Going Great

Is it true that what goes up must come down?

Photo by Andre Frueh on Unsplash

I realized today that it’s much easier for me to talk about my struggles than to celebrate success.

So let me tell you about rock bottom first, and what I learned along the way.

I usually tell people that my life got interesting when I quit my job and started a nonprofit with a stranger who I met on the internet.

But really, it started six months before that in Tokyo, Japan.

My rock bottom

I was sitting in the lobby of the Kaisu hostel one morning, violently hungover. We had gone to a karaoke bar the night before and the night had ended with me pouring Redbull into my beers and chugging them.

Yeah, it wasn’t a winning strategy.

As I attempted to piece myself back together with green tea and a Tim Ferriss podcast, I heard something that changed my life.

Tim was talking about a palliative care nurse named Bronnie Ware who had interviewed over 500 people on their death bed. She would ask them what they regretted most in life and it turned out that nearly everyone regretted the same five things.