Have you taken the graveyard test yet ? This may change your perspective to life

Robin Sharma is one of my favorite authors. It is in one of his books that I read about taking a Graveyard Test. This concept is not new. We have heard this from many people that you should live everyday as its your last day so that you can maximize and prioritize what you do in that day. Don't get them wrong. They aren't preaching you to live in fear. They are just teaching you to stop taking your day in life for granted.

So what is this graveyard test. I am mentioning a simple and modified version. Please do this as you read this blog -

1) Close your eyes.

2) Revisit your life since the time you were born.

3) Also rethink about the future you wanted.

4) Now imagine that today is your last day. Yes, as much painful it may sound, the results are going to astonish you.

5) Now write your accomplishments and regrets

6) If you list of regrets is more then the list of your accomplishments, you have yet not lived a fulfilling life yet.

7) From now on, every day work on eliminating your regrets.

Still not sold on the idea? Let me give you the results I got when I did this in 2009 and again when I did it recently.

In 2009, this was my regret list :

1) Haven't found a life partner who I can spend the whole life with

2)Haven't started my entrepreneurial journey yet.

3) Haven't met my goal of studying masters in the US.

4) Haven't met my goal of living and working in the US.

5) Haven't been able to reach and help as many people as I would want to

6) Haven't achieved the Financial stability I wish so that I can reach financial independence

In 2021 , this is my regret list

1) Tried entrepreneurial journey (in 2010) but got to try again , more harder this time

2) Have tried to reach more and more people to help them but still no where near to what I believe I can do. Specially want to do something for poor people. I have helped 1000 plus students on LinkedIn during the peak of pandemic and I also volunteer with non-profit so that I can reach out to more and more people and offer my help/support.

3) Manage my anger without changing my core.

4) I am more stable financially now but still a long way to go for Financial independence. I want to do this as this is critical to me being able to help people.

 

What do you observe? I don't have as many regrets as I had in 2009. Also , the regrets I have now are more  work in progress accomplishments-to-be. But in the 2009 version, I would have had an unfulfilling life if I were to die then. It is this grave yard test that pushed me to work hard to eliminate things from my regret list. I will keep taking my accomplishments and regrets as examples in this blog , not to brag about my-self but to drive home my points.

Now lets see some of the common regrets I see in people's list

1) To be able to spend time with family.

2) To be in good relation with people that matter to you especially to those for whom you matter too.

3) Not doing the job you like or not having a career that you will like.

4) Not living the life as they would like to. 

5) Not having a purpose in life.

Did you have these on your list too? Lets talk about these one by one.

Are you so occupied with life that you are not able to spend time with your family ? Do you only look for weekends to spend that time? Or worst, Do you look for special occasions to spend that time ?

Many of us keep ourselves so busy in life - chasing dreams, chasing success, chasing money that we start to overlook our families. We don't spend time doing day to day activities with family.  Doing breakfast together, doing dinner together, watching TV, playing with kids or just talking to each other. Many I have met say - "when I would achieve success or earned enough money then I will have ample time". They don't realize the moments they are missing with family at present. You wont be this young in few years, your kids wont be this young. Not everyone in the family will be under one roof and may be not everyone will be there in this world. Don't wait for a time which may never come. Live a better life with your family everyday. I am not saying stop chasing dreams or success or money , do it but balance it because what good will be achieving these at the cost of family.

The second one is more common as the world has changed, families have gone nuclear and we all try to live life our own way. Don't get me wrong. I for sure feel we should live life the way we want and surely not life a life influenced by family members. We will talk more about it when we discuss regret #4. But here we are talking about regret #2 - "To be in good relation with people that matter to you"

Its hard to keep relations good with everyone especially when you differ with their thinking and way of life. Its much more hard when you don't keep relations just for sake. For me there is a relationship or there is not. I don't have a middle ground for a relationship as I don't pretend to keep a relationship. I cant be fake too. I also struggle to not speak up if there is something not going right in a relationship or if I don't like a behavior. So given this, you might guess, that I not keeping relations must be my regret. Well, actually not. I am known to be a rebel in family, I am also known to say the tough thing or the not so good thing. But I am also to keep relations that matter to me no matter how stormy sometimes a relationship may get. I also apply this wisdom about relations -  Relation is two way street constantly under construction, any relation which is not a two way street and is not under construction isn't real , its fake. So, because I don't pretend or keep fake relations, my relations are generally strong and hence do not break this easily. What worst will be to leave the world with the regrets that you stopped talking to folks who mattered so much to you or you kept the relations at a distance.

There is new trend I see in today's world. When we get new people in life - a girl friend, a boy friend or a spouse, we start to impact existing relations with families on either side. Yes, its is life that not everyone will take your relations the same way you do. And may be same is true for you - you wont take your girl/boy friend's or spouse's relations the same way. And it could also be true that although you treat new members in the family as yours but they don't. Even worst when there are people  pretend that they do take you as part of family but they really don't. But then wouldn't you regret when you leave  that may be you could have given all relations a chance and may be you & your better half could lived a better life if you did so.

 

I am of-course not saying everyone is so pious that you will get along with all. But just having a mindset to destroy existing relations is detrimental to your own quality of life. Sometimes we start good and when things happen, without even giving the relations a few days, months we immediately resort to breaking that relations. We say that the other person has made a gross mistake. But don't we also make gross mistakes. So why not learn to be forgiving. I am stressing on this point more because I see so many broken families today where a brother has stopped talking to a sister or vice versa , a son or a daughter has stopped  taking to their parents or their better half's parents. And they also justify it by having many reasons, But believe me when you are in your graveyard none of those reasons will matter. You will die crying and repenting. Is that how you want to die ?
Its hard to keep real relations in this world but its much more hard to leave the world regretting about a relation you wanted to keep.

 

Let's briefly touch on the third common regret - "Not doing the job you like or not having a career that you will like". This one is for folks who are stuck doing a work they hate doing or they don't really enjoy doing it. They ended up here because either they made wrong education /career choices or someone else made these choices for them.  So every day for them is a struggle because they spent a majority of day doing something that they don't like doing.  Relate to this ? Its okay if your answer is yes. You are not alone Many of us are or were in this situation. But the good news is that today's world lets you change what your job and or industry fairly smoothly. I am not  saying its a cake walk to change the course of your life. Everything requires an effort and doing work you like sure does. However, we get trapped in life so much that we cant even think of changing jobs when you know you don't like it. I encourage you to challenge the status quo and I urge you that you take steps to do a job you like. You don't want to die with a regret that you could not do a job you liked. When we spent 8-10 hrs in a day working, it better be a job we like else we will not be happy and satisfied and this unhappiness will impact other aspect of you life too. Be the change you want to see in your life by taking action to take up a job you like.

 

Lets touch briefly on the last point -  Not having a purpose in life. Not having a purpose in life is like driving a car without directions, at the end of day you wouldn't know why you were driving and where you were driving to. Ask yourself this - would you want to die without knowing and without serving your purpose in life? I talk about this more in my blog here.

So what are you waiting for? Go do your grave-yard test and spread the word (& love). Go live life!!!!