The #1 Regret Of The Dying and What It Means For You (1942)

Regret is a powerful emotion, often realized too late. In this episode, hosts Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros share lessons from Bronnie Ware’s The Top Five Regrets of the Dying, reflecting on why courage and self-awareness are essential to living authentically. From personal stories of adversity to practical strategies for building self-worth, this episode offers valuable insights for anyone seeking greater purpose and fulfillment.

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Show notes:
(2:01) Life-altering car accident
(5:19) The top 5 regrets of the dying
(7:34) Why being yourself is hard
(11:56) The cost of living a life you hate
(18:05) Job Vs. Career Vs. Calling
(20:18) Next Level Dreamliner: the planner, agenda, journal, and habit tracker to rule them all. Get a copy: https://a.co/d/9fPpxEt
(29:32) From struggles to success
(34:38) Living without regrets
(36:26) Outro

🎙️ Hosted by Kevin Palmieri and Alan Lazaros

Next Level University is a top-ranked daily podcast for dream chasers and self-improvement lovers. With over 2,100 episodes, we help you level up in life, love, health, and wealth one day at a time. Subscribe for real, honest, no-fluff growth every single day.

Transcript

Kevin Palmieri 0:00

my thought process from where I currently am , is , if I am successful enough to remove all the resistance I had when I was a kid , I'll actually be happy . And the resistance that I had was I didn't have money , I didn't feel like I had any , any resemblance of a future , and I was super insecure and I thought if I went and accumulated and accomplished all these external things , I'd feel really good about me more than anything . That , anything . I think that's the depths of why I was doing it , job , career calling .

Alan Lazaros 0:29

The one thing that I want to make sure lands here is I hope you're building a career , not just working a job , because long term that's what's going to matter .

Kevin Palmieri 0:40

Welcome to Next Level University . I'm your host , Kevin .

Alan Lazaros 0:44

Palmieri , and I'm your co-host , alan Lazarus .

Kevin Palmieri 0:48

At NLU , we believe in a heart-driven but no BS approach to holistic self-improvement for dream chasers . Our goal with every episode is to help you level relationships , boundaries , consistency , habits and defining your own unique version of success Self-improvement in your pocket , every day , from anywhere , completely free .

Kevin Palmieri 1:23

Welcome to Next Level University , next Level Nation . Welcome back to another episode of Next Level University where we help you level up your life , your love , your health and your wealth . Today , for episode number 1942 , the number one regret of the dying , alan introduced me to a book called the Top Five Regrets of the Dying and I'm going to let Alan tell the story . But I had an idea for what could be a pretty cool episode . So after Alan tells the story we will figure out whether or not we can make it a cool episode , this life-changing book

Life-altering car accident

Kevin Palmieri 2:01

.

Alan Lazaros 2:01

So for those of you who don't know my story , I'm going to be as brief as humanly possible . So when I was two years old many of you know my father passed away in a car accident when he was 28 years old . When I was 26 years old , I was in my own car accident . It was a head-on collision with a lift-kitted pickup truck up in New Hampshire back in 2015 . Dark winter night , the snow banks were covering the yield sign . I was supposed to yield . I didn't . My fault , not a fender bender . This was a very intense car crash and normally in my speeches I'll show the picture of my car . It is totaled , the entire front end is smashed in , but the frame stayed . I thank Volkswagen , thank you , thank you , thank you .

Alan Lazaros 2:45

I was driving a 2004 Volkswagen Passat that I bought in five grand cash because all I cared about was getting out of debt and building my investment portfolio , but anyways . So that was what really was the turning point in my life where I found self-improvement and I started a little company called Alan Lazarus LLC . What you'll never learn in school but desperately in all caps need to know , and I wanted to bring personal development to the school systems and that was a huge mistake . Good luck getting speeches at schools and high schools and colleges with that slogan what you'll never be taught here , but I'll come in and teach it to you . So stupid , but anyways . So I did have some success early on blah , blah , blah .

Alan Lazaros 3:28

But at 26 , it was a very rattling time for me for lack of a better phrasing where I faced mortality and it was sort of the second chance my dad never got and I was filled with regret who am I ? What am I doing with my life ? What's the point ? Existential quarter life crisis situation . And obviously I just faced mortality . So I picked up a book . I noticed a book and we talk about the reticular activating system . So if I say 72 , 72 , 72 , 72 , 72 , everyone watching or listening is more likely to see 72 somewhere and then think it's synchronicity when in reality I primed your brain for it . So I was primed for this book .

Alan Lazaros 4:16

It's not a coincidence that I notice a book called the Top Five Regrets of the Dying , when I almost just got in a car accident where I almost died and I was filled with regret and I was reconsidering my entire life . So I found a book by a woman named Debrani Ware . She's from Australia . She worked in hospice for eight years with the terminally ill and these are people who were told you're going to die within this timeframe , statistically speaking , and she was taking care of them and she realized that my job was to take care of them and their health at the end of their life . But my purpose , my calling , was to write this book called the Top Five Regrets of the Dying . She also has a TED Talk . We also interviewed her , which is really cool . So this was four years after my car accident . We got to interview Bronnie Ware and I got to show her my flashcard that I'm now showing the camera on YouTube . This is a tattered old flashcard that I wrote at the beginning of 2018 . And now it's all kind of disgusting and ripped up , but it's called the Top Five Regrets of the Dying and the book . I highly recommend it .

The top 5 regrets of the dying

Alan Lazaros 5:19

But the top five regrets are number one I wish I had lived a life true to myself and not what others expected of me , and that was the one that hit really home for me . And then the third one as well is another one that hit home for me . I'll give you all of them , but the third one is I wish I had the courage to express my true feelings . So number one is I wish I had the . I wish I had lived a life true to myself and not what others expected of me . For the people pleasers among us that one will reign true , ring true . Number two I wish I hadn't worked so hard . So I actually asked Bonnie . I said , bonnie , I don't want to impose on your work .

Kevin Palmieri 5:56

Bronnie .

Alan Lazaros 5:57

Bronnie . I'm sorry , bronnie . Thank you , bronnie , I have a client named Bonnie . That's my bad , bronnie , I don't want to impose on your work . But I think the second one of I wish I hadn't worked so hard is actually because of number one , because if you're not doing something aligned with who you really are , you might regret hard work . Now that I'm aligned with who I really am , I don't think I'm gonna regret my hard work . She said that makes a lot of sense . Number three I wish I had the courage to express my true feelings . Number four I wish I stayed in touch with my friends . Number five I wish that I let myself allowed myself to be happier , and so she was working in hospice with the terminal ill and she's noticed these same common patterns of I wish , I wish , I wish . And the number one is I wish I lived a life true to myself , not what others expected of me , and that helped me redesign my entire present and future towards something that I wouldn't feel that same regret again when I do face mortality one day .

Kevin Palmieri 6:59

Well said , very well said . Okay , this was my thought for the episode . Do you think , think , and again , this isn't going to be a definitive yes or no answer . Obviously there's intricacies to this do you think it's harder to get to the end of your life and regret that than it is to actually do all of the challenging work ? Set the boundaries , build the self-worth , build the self-belief ? Do all of the challenging work ? Set the boundaries , build the self-worth , build the self-belief , do all of that stuff to actually live a life that's true to you .

Why being yourself is hard

Kevin Palmieri 7:34

That's my thought , Because when we hear that and again , I'm a huge fan of the book and I love Bronny huge fan and I'm not trying to negate that in any way , and I love Bronny huge fan and I'm not trying to negate that in any way but of course , the regret is going to be something that maybe you didn't have the courage to do because it's so freaking difficult .

Alan Lazaros 7:55

Yeah , it's so scary .

Kevin Palmieri 7:56

I don't want it to be left out . Yeah , I could tell you for a lot of my life that I probably would have regretted the way I was living . I just didn't know how to not live that way .

Alan Lazaros 8:06

Yeah , so that was 10 years ago , my car accident . I'm 36 now . I was 26 at the time and I have , for I've really dialed up living a life true to myself and not what others expected of me , consistently ever since . There's been ups and downs and highs , lows , ebbs and flows , but the trend line is way up and I can't say I'm 100% living a life true to myself and not what others expected of me , that's for sure . But it's definitely more percentage , more percentage , more percentage , more percentage . And it has been so unreasonably difficult , so hard to do , and so I do think that we talk about this often . We used to say this all the time . This is a quote of yours . You can take the feedback a little bit at a time or you can get it all at once at the end , and we use a fitness show .

Alan Lazaros 8:59

I got stomped at a fitness show once . I did three shows . First , one I lost , came in humble , won . The second one came in arrogant , lost . The third one came in fifth , first and then fourth , and I think the fourth one would have been first again . But we'll see . Maybe I'll do one again one day . I probably won't , but my point is , is Kev used to say , dude , you're going to lose , because in the one that I won I was doing check-ins . I was . I say , dude , you're going to lose , because in the one that I won I was doing check-ins . I had a posing coach , I had a nutrition coach . I was constantly checking in , I was taking the photos , I was doing it , doing it , doing it , stepping on the scale , every day , track of my macros . So I was getting feedback every single day and then leading up to the show , of course , best shape of my life . But on the off ones where I lost , I wasn't taking as much feedback along the way . Let's just say hypothetically that I was eating a lot of pizza .

Kevin Palmieri 9:48

Broccoli Alfredo pizzas , regularly Broccoli chicken .

Alan Lazaros 9:52

Alfredo , sorry , that's not how you win fitness shows the entire pizza too .

Kevin Palmieri 9:59

It was a good life . Yeah , yeah , it was good until you got on stage .

Alan Lazaros 10:03

Yeah , yeah , until I got on stage . If you look good backstage , you're in trouble on stage , is the saying . So I wasn't lean enough . But anyways , the To answer your original question . I do think it's harder to end up at the end of your life and have all the regret . However , on the day-to-day it's way easier .

Kevin Palmieri 10:24

Well , that's the challenging thing is , I went and saw my mom and my grandmother last weekend . Tara and I went down and my grandmother smoked for like 40 years . She smoked cigarettes for a long time , I mean when she first started smoking . My grandmother's gonna be 89 this year . When she first started smoking , there were no studies on how bad cigarettes were and they were like yeah , these are good for you .

Kevin Palmieri 10:47

Like okay yeah , cool , and I think she started smoking when she was in her teens , like 13 , 14 , maybe . My mom stopped smoking , I think six years ago and it's cool . She has a tracker on her phone . She saved like $25,000 since she stopped smoking just from not smoking alone .

Alan Lazaros 11:07

That's awesome .

Kevin Palmieri 11:07

And that doesn't include the fact that cigarette prices have changed a ton . I don't know what they are , obviously , but of course now they say they regret smoking for as long as they did because they were able to get on the opposite track of that , the hard thing is almost everything that we regret there's less resistance to doing in the moment , and I think that's why self-awareness and self-improvement in these conversations are so important , because something has to snap you out of the way you're living and I think that's why so many people focus on and we did this for a long time having really inspirational , motivational guests on that have gone through a lot of adversity and they're still living a life true to themselves , even though people told them they would never be able to do that again . Those types of interviews

The cost of living a life you hate

Kevin Palmieri 11:56

.

Kevin Palmieri 11:56

I remember the thing that broke me free , that made me question things . I was living in New Hampshire by myself . I think this was the year after my partner left me and I hit my rock bottom and I was grinding my face off trying to make as much money as possible , trying to be successful , quote , unquote . And I remember listening to a podcast with Joe Rogan and Duncan Trussell and they were talking about how strange it is that most of us essentially dedicate our lives to things that we just don't like at all , and that I mean , I was thinking of that before , but that day , when I heard it something , it was different . It was like , oh my goodness , I'm doing the same thing .

Alan Lazaros 12:38

Wasn't it the alien metaphor of if an alien came down ?

Kevin Palmieri 12:41

I don't know if they said that . Can you tell that ?

Alan Lazaros 12:44

story , because I want to share the opposite frame of that . You're not doing it for no reason . You're doing it because it allows you to have a great home and it allows you to have certainty of paying your bills and it allows you to eat dessert every night and dude , yeah , yeah , yeah , the things that generate revenue . It's not for no reason . You're not going to a job you hate , for no reason . You're doing it for the paycheck .

Kevin Palmieri 13:05

So this was , this was . I don't know if it was from that podcast or if I came up with this later . I genuinely don't know . But the example was imagine if an alien from another planet landed on your front lawn tomorrow morning and they walked into your house and you weren't freaking out . When they walked into your house it's like , hey , I'm alan the alien . It's like sad dude , kevin , nice to meet you come , come in , watch me live my life . They see you wake up at six o'clock . They see you shower furiously , make your coffee , rush to get everything done , put on clothes you don't want to put on , get into a car that you really can't afford and leave the house that you can't really afford , to go to the place that allows you to afford the things that you can't afford without the thing that you're going to . But you actually hate . Potentially I'm not saying everybody hates their job I think statistically , unfortunately , most people don't enjoy it , two-thirds is unengaged .

Alan Lazaros 14:01

If you look at the stats , two-thirds , so approximately .

Kevin Palmieri 14:03

Again , don't okay , so 66 to every you know well , if you listen to this in 2023 I'm sorry 2027 , then we will be inaccurate , yeah so you go work this job for eight , nine , ten , twelve hours , depending on what you're doing . You come home , you pull into the driveway Just enough sunlight to see to walk into your house . It's dark out . You left it was dark . You got home it was dark . Now it's six o'clock at night . You get to spend two hours with your family Three hours hours , if you're lucky . You go to bed and then you do the same shit the next day . And you do that for what would it be Five ?

Alan Lazaros 14:45

out of the seven days .

Kevin Palmieri 14:48

Yeah , so what is that ? What would the percentage of that be ? Five times ?

Alan Lazaros 14:51

52, . Hold on Five times 52 weeks . 260 divided by 365 times 100 , 71% of the time .

Kevin Palmieri 14:58

Okay , so 71% of your life is that .

Alan Lazaros 15:02

To hopefully live , not including holidays and weekend . Not including holidays and like time off . Paid time off , yeah , yeah .

Kevin Palmieri 15:08

So you do all that , so you can kind of do what you want with the remaining 29% of your existence .

Kevin Palmieri 15:16

And the alien sat you down and said wait , everybody does this , this is just the way you live down here and you're like , yeah , this is what it is , this is normal . Now , some people have different opportunities and some people do different things . But yeah , I mean , I can't tell you how many times I've run into someone and they'll say I'll say , hey , how you doing . And they'll say , ah , you know , whatever , how are you ? And I'll say I'm living the dream . And then I I very quickly realized how fast that , how , how quickly a mistake that was . When I say that , because a lot of people get offended when I say that because they're not living the dream Understandably , so All right . And I just say that because they're not living the dream Understandably , so I just say that because I'm in a good mood . I'm not necessarily living the dream either . Some days I have shitty days . I'm sick right now . I don't want to be sick , I want to be at the gym and crushing it , but most many people , unfortunately , are not .

Alan Lazaros 16:09

This was , at one point , a dream .

Kevin Palmieri 16:10

Yes , but not every day is the dream and I think sometimes people think that I'm rolling through Taco Bell at 2 o'clock on a Monday because I'm sick and I'm saying I'm living the dream . Of course you're probably not going to fuck with me , you're not going to vibe with me . Come on , dude . Couldn't you just say you're doing okay , yeah , no , that's fair . I understand .

Alan Lazaros 16:31

I understand you have an interesting relationship with that For me , just because you're working again , just coming in here being me . You're working at taco bell , but that's not . That's not where you're going to end up , necessarily . I think I always saw it as a ladder I never saw it as like I work terrible jobs .

Alan Lazaros 16:51

I hate like busboy car kit , like I hate . But it was never . I painted houses in maine . It was a . It was a ladder to something greater . I think that's one of the things that's been a biggest blind spot for me is you . You've said this to me and behind the scenes , you've said sometimes that's , that's it like that's where they stay .

Kevin Palmieri 17:10

Yeah , and to me I can't even like that's .

Alan Lazaros 17:13

I don't think that way . I don't everything's a progression toward toward a climb . Everything's a climb ? I don't think that way . I don't . Everything's a progression toward a climb .

Kevin Palmieri 17:19

Everything's a climb . I don't think you were ever going to be that guy , but I could have been that guy for sure . That's what I felt . I felt that early in life I thought I was going to be the gas station guy forever .

Alan Lazaros 17:29

Okay , well , can we again ? This wasn't the point of the episode , but I want to have this discussion with you . You know you work at , let's say , mcdonald's let's just use that as an example because everyone knows it and then you work your way up and eventually you're the manager , and then you are the GM , and then you run multiple franchises and then , like I just can't . You know now that you obviously you're not like high school kids that work at mcdonald's . They're working at mcdonald's right now , but that's not like their entire career .

Job Vs. Career Vs. Calling

Alan Lazaros 18:05

There's a quote some people have a job , some people have a career , some people have a calling , and what I'm trying to share here , without coming off as pretentious , is I didn't find my calling until after that car accident . I had a career . I had a really really , really , really strong career , but I was focused on building my career from when I was a little kid . I never just had a job . And I remember when I was younger .

Alan Lazaros 18:32

I remember being in high school and then particularly in college . This is when I started to notice I had a lot of friends that worked at a bowling alley and I noticed like they weren't focused on building their resume . And I remember thinking to myself you're making money and you love it and you're making more than enough now , but like you do realize that's not going to be enough later on , especially where we live . We live in one of the highest cost of living on planet earth . I mean this is atrociously bad . I mean Massachusetts is four on the list , like there's California . It's really expensive to live here and I , I I don't think people I don't mean to come off pretentious with this , but like if you don't think about that , that's like very negative for your future . You can't just like not make more money and then expect things to go better when the cost of living that's your math and your long term strategy .

Kevin Palmieri 19:33

I don't think most people are thinking about that . I don't think most people are . I think it's very easy to go get a job and then the next thing you know it's five , seven , ten years down the line and you're still doing the same thing you were doing before and you have no idea . Now that's part of your identity . Now you don't feel like you can do anything else , Maybe to your point . You haven't been building your resume , you haven't moved up because you don't want to take on more responsibility to take on more responsibility .

Alan Lazaros 20:02

Yeah , I think that's , I don't know . I don't know what the stats are . I remember I took an internship , started interview . I took an internship at irobot for less money because I knew it would look good on a resume . Irobot is one of the most successful robotics companies in history . I mean that means something , right ?

Next Level Dreamliner: the planner, agenda, journal, and habit tracker to rule them all. Get a copy:

Alan Lazaros 20:18

Hello , hello , hello . Nlu listener . Thank you , as always , for listening to Next Level University . Real quick , I just want to jump in and let you know about the Next Level Dreamliner .

Alan Lazaros 20:27

This is a journal that I use every single day . Achieve your dreams 90 days at a time . It breaks down your dreams into goals , milestones and daily habits . We hope you enjoy it . The link will be in the show notes . And I remember I went to my master's after getting job offers and I stayed for my MBA and I turned down like 70 grand a year and I probably could have worked at like an Intel or one of those , and a lot of my friends did that . They worked at Intel or whatever Microsoft . And I remember thinking like , no , I'm going to stay for my master's because I know that's the long-term win . I stayed broke , dude . I had like a $1,200 car .

Kevin Palmieri 21:08

I stayed like broke . That's you , that's a you thing . That's like Michael Jordan saying well , I could have shot a three or I could have dunked it , and I decided to do this fancy layup In layup in a way again .

Alan Lazaros 21:29

You worked really hard to get to where you are , as did michael jordan , but like think , about the opportunity .

Kevin Palmieri 21:31

Yeah , that's , but I don't want to . I don't want to lessen . That's my goal and that is not . But like I didn't have , that that was , those were not my options . Now , if I went back to young kev and I really dedicated myself to school , would that have been an option ? Fuck , no , no , that wouldn't . That wouldn't have been an option .

Alan Lazaros 21:43

No , you thought I was going in a different direction there , didn't you ? Yeah , I did , I did . You know . I remember thinking like this is gonna suck , I'm gonna . Not only am I not gonna make the 70 grand I got offered , I'm actually gonna spend money more money at school . I remember money , more money at school . I remember my master's program .

Alan Lazaros 22:05

It doesn't feel good to be like the brokest college student ever . Like college was fucking brutal . You just don't have any fucking money at all , right . And I remember I had a friend . He said when are you gonna get a real job ? And I remember being and this friend is also a dickhead uh , but I I ended up saying like what do you define as a real job ? He said a 40 hour a week job . And I said , oh , not for a couple years , then probably , like I'll do internships , but like I'm gonna go to school . And and I now understand , like he didn't know this , like he didn't know this , like he had no idea that this was like and I don't know why I did . I just felt like career stuff always came like very easy to me and for anyone out there , job career calling like the one thing that I want to make sure lands . Here is you . I hope you're building a career , not just working a job , because long term that's what's going to matter , you know I just know it's .

Kevin Palmieri 23:04

It's a challenge for it . I think it's more of a challenge than you probably think fair just because it came natural ? Yeah , and I think it's a just like again for me . I'm good at squatting compared to the statistical . Yeah for sure , squatting is harder than you think I've got right . Giraffe skinny mini legs I saw a guy at the gym the other day . He's a .

Alan Lazaros 23:24

He's six foot four , skinny as hell , and I just remember thinking like I feel you man , he's , he's , he's top heavy , he's jacked , but it's like his legs , it's . I can't grow my legs to save my fucking life .

Kevin Palmieri 23:36

Well , in my mind , it's like good for you to be able to reach the top shelf . I'd rather be able to reach the top shelf than be able to squat however much I can squat .

Alan Lazaros 23:44

But when your legs are like however many feet five feet long or four feet long or whatever it is probably three and a half they're so damn skinny it sucks . I'm top heavy . It's very hard not to be top heavy . We all have pros and cons to everything . That's I heavy for me . I think it's hard . We all have pros and cons to everything .

Kevin Palmieri 24:02

That's , I think , the point it's hard for me not to be bottom heavy . I think I feel like I've agreed , but then again I feel like I have little calves . I think most , most gentlemen feel like they have tiny calves . It's like a thing for some reason .

Alan Lazaros 24:11

Oh , it's a flawed design yeah growing your calves is not easy for most people . For me , it feels impossible yeah well the point of this episode .

Kevin Palmieri 24:22

The goal in this episode is to talk about the fact that , of course , the number one regret is going to be something that's so well connected to , or so easily connected to , something that's really hard . It's really really hard to live a life that's true to yourself , because you're most likely not living by yourself . You're living in communities with people who don't necessarily care whether or not you live a life true to yourself , and that makes it really really really hard and you have to have courage . What would you say to the alien ?

Alan Lazaros 24:58

because if the alien says really , why are you doing this ? There's a reason I would say . Can I want to give both sides of the coin . Well , I'm doing this because I want to have a shelter and I want to have consistent food on the table and I want to raise a family in a safe environment , in a safe neighborhood .

Kevin Palmieri 25:15

Like there's a reason why you're going to that job Mine was because my thought process from where I currently am is , if I am successful enough to remove all the resistance I had when I was a kid , I'll actually be happy . And the resistance that I had was I didn't have money , I didn't feel like I had any any resemblance of a future and I was super insecure and I thought if I went and accumulated and accomplished all these external things , I'd feel really good about me . More than anything . I think that's the depths of why I was doing it . A lot of that's probably unconscious , but that's what I would say . I have a tickle in my throat because I'm still sick , so pardon me if I have to cough .

Alan Lazaros 26:03

All good , brother . I want to try to give both ends of the coin . So I'm sitting down with this alien . We'll call this alien Mr Alien or Mrs Alien . We'll go , mrs . We'll go , mrs . Shout out to the women .

Kevin Palmieri 26:17

I don't think my wife would like Mrs Alien walking in on us when we're showering in the morning probably not .

Alan Lazaros 26:25

what if Mrs Alien was very respectful ?

Kevin Palmieri 26:27

yeah , okay , I can dig that Mrs .

Alan Lazaros 26:30

Alien , welcome to our humble abode . The reason why I'm doing what I'm doing is because I want to build a bigger , better , brighter future for myself , for my family and for the community . And I have to work a bigger , better , brighter future for myself , for my family , for and for the community . And I have to work hard to do that . And although I don't love what I'm doing now , I'm working toward building A career that I do love , more and more and more year after year , and the amount of revenue that I can generate , income that I can generate from that career Is going to consistently increase the quality of my life and my family's life as well .

Alan Lazaros 27:03

And then I'll also be able to give back to causes that I care about . And again , obviously this is like that's like an ideal version , but no one really teaches all that I really wish . In school we taught like , okay , three paths . Path one is do a job you hate just to pay the bills , don't ever build any real wealth and kind of regret it . Path two is go all in on only your dreams and be an artist , and if you don't make it , you don't make it too bad . Uh , sorry , you know your drawings aren't good and you're now broke or dependent on other people for your , for your , shelter . Path three there's a third option . The third option is I'm going to try to do what I have to do until I can do what I want to do .

Alan Lazaros 27:46

You and I , in the beginning , did a lot more of what we had to do to get here , and we still have a lot we have to do . I don't wake up in the morning and go . You know , I feel like going for a walk today . I don't really feel like podcasting today , like that's not how it works . If I did that enough days in a row , we would go out of business , and so the idea , I think , is hopefully your life gets consistently better and better and better and better , through doing both hard things that you don't want to do and the things that you're grateful you did , so that long term , you're bettering your best and you , at the end of your life , at least you can say you know what I did all I could with all I had . I was resourceful , I was humble , I was virtuous and I didn't know everything . But I , I learned and I grew and I I built a life that I can be proud of and I became a person that I can be proud of . And I I know that that sounds a little fortune cookie , but ultimately that's what's fulfilling anyway , and I I'm very , very proud of where I've ended up , believe it or not . Like I appreciate that . I mean I'm much less successful . I think in some regards that I had hoped , but I also know that I'm much more successful in other areas than I ever imagined , like my relationship with Emilia and you know our pets and our , our beautiful life . So I'm very grateful .

Alan Lazaros 29:02

But one of the biggest challenges about being where we are now , kev , is it's so hard to explain how bad it used to be . Like I said this on a podcast recently . I said this is such a not real problem . I know that most of my problems nowadays are not real problems , which which I'm grateful for , but they still suck and I'm always holding that duality . It's like these are not real problems but and they're really challenging .

From struggles to success

Alan Lazaros 29:32

So I say I look like someone who was kind of born on third base and it can come off very pretentious to like third base and it can come off very pretentious to like oh well , it must be nice , alan . You know , you , you have a team now and you you run your own company and you're successful and you , you're so educated , it's . It's one of those things of like , how do I , how do I explain that at one point I was so unreasonably miserable and I never felt like I was completely lost because I always believed in myself . So there's that for sure and I always believed in my brighter future . That never went away , so I'm very grateful for that . But that , like , in the dark , there was only one star that's the best way I can describe it . I was in nothing but darkness and there was just only one light and it was just above me and it's like the north star and it just , it just never went out .

Alan Lazaros 30:31

But I , you know , lost my dad broke , stepdad broke . You know all the challenges , all the adversities , health issues , car accidents , family stuff . I mean it was nothing short of absolutely terrible a lot of the time , like a lot of the time , and I now it's not terrible , most of the time is pretty great . My worst day now is better than my best day was back then . For sure , and I still have tough moments , for sure , and I still have tough days , but it's nothing in comparison to that beginning part .

Alan Lazaros 31:09

You know , losing your dad and just my mom and stepdad did not get along and it was just really very challenging . So it's just hard . Now that that's such an interesting problem I never thought I'd have is trying to explain that , yeah , we're successful . It's like this we're successful , but not nearly as successful as we're shooting for , but yet infinitely more successful than where we came from . And we've accomplished I'm super proud of , and it's less than I thought , but also more in other ways and we still are like wildly fucking up on the reg . It's just a weird thing to explain , you know .

Kevin Palmieri 31:57

I do . I mean , obviously , my journey Been different and is different because my experience in life is different . But yeah , I understand it's very challenging . Again , if this is one out of the eight calls we do a day , you only are seeing a little bit of the . There's so much that goes on behind the scenes . That's wonderful and it is hard and it's challenging , but what it took to get here is challenging in different ways .

Alan Lazaros 32:23

It's almost like everything it's taken to get here is worse than anyone thinks . However , it's still worth it . That's like the best way I can describe it . It's like being a CEO of this company has been so much worse than I ever could have thought in certain ways , and it's so much worse than anyone who interviews me thinks . However , it's still so , so worth it , like I'm so grateful we did it . And I want to hear your perspective on this too , because we're not trying to say not to do it . I think what we're trying to share is like , let's be real , most people don't achieve their dreams , not because they don't want to , but because it's not as great as people think , but it's still worth it . It's still , I'm saying , still do it .

Kevin Palmieri 33:04

I think that's the whole thesis in this episode is we have the perspective that we have from Brawny in the book stating the number one , the top regret of the dying , and we can use that as an opportunity to understand that , yeah , it's probably going to suck along the way . Being yourself is one of the hardest things in the world . It's not easy . It sucks , it's challenging , it's hard , there's resistance , people are going to judge you . It's going to happen , but the alternative is worse . The alternative is worse and I think about this all the time .

Kevin Palmieri 33:37

How privileged am I ? I seriously , and again , I grind my face off and I work really hard and I've made a lot of sacrifices to get here and I'm privileged in the fact that I get to make my own schedule and I've been able to lay in bed essentially all day for the last three days and just get rest , and I don't have paid time off and I'm not it's not like I'm using hours to do that . So there's an and there I've made sure that we and you still showed up to the podcast .

Alan Lazaros 34:06

Yeah , we're not . And you still showed up to group coaching ?

Kevin Palmieri 34:08

We're not missing episodes and WhatsApp's taken care of and the team is crushing it , so I don't have to communicate as much as I normally do because the team is . They know I'm down and If I'm shaking it's I can tell . When you have to pee , you get very antsy . We do have to hop here in a minute because we have our team call , but that would be my takeaway for this episode is it's really hard to live a life true to yourself , but I am willing to bet .

Living without regrets

Kevin Palmieri 34:38

Yeah , it's worth it , and I'm willing to bet that if you knew you were going to get to the end of your life and that was going to be your biggest regret , that would be some extra motivation , inspiration . It's just really hard to hold that at all times , because it's really easy to to lose sight of . So that's my takeaway , what's yours , and then we'll let you pee . That's it it's it's .

Alan Lazaros 34:54

It's the better alternative . But life is hard inherently . No matter what you do , no matter what path you take , it's going to be hard . I think life is inherently challenging and I think in the 21st century we lose sight of that , particularly those of us in in more privilege . Uh , and I think it's the better alternative . And every single day you have an opportunity to build a bigger , better , brighter future and eventually you might wake up one day and go Holy crap , my life is unbelievable compared to what it was , and I think that's what matters . Right , it's old me versus new me versus potential me , it's you versus you , because my circumstances are what they are . Some people have it better , some people have it worse , but as long as I'm climbing and I'm becoming a better version of me , the you versus you thing , I think , is really critical to remember . I always go back to that because that's what's going to fulfill you anyway back to that , because that's what's going to fulfill you anyway .

Kevin Palmieri 35:47

So if you want to take who you used to be , who you are today and who you could be , and you want to mend them together with next levelness , I've been saying this is kind of our new , it's not going to be a part of the brand , but self-improvement philosophied is what I've been saying a lot lately , and by a lot I mean I've said it one time to Alan and then never thought about it again . But now I'm thinking about it , Philosophized or philosophied .

Alan Lazaros 36:05

Solosophied . Did you say solosophied ?

Kevin Palmieri 36:11

Philosophied , nice ? Is that right ? I think so . Okay , self-improvement , philosophied is what I'm going with . Did you say solosophied ? I might have , I don't even know . I can barely breathe . My throat is so ticklish right now that I can barely speak without talking .

Outro

Kevin Palmieri 36:26

As always , we love you , we appreciate you , grateful for each and every one of you , and at NLU we don't have fans , we have family .

Alan Lazaros 36:34

We will talk to you all tomorrow Stay Next Level , next Level Nation .

Kevin Palmieri 36:40

Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level University . We love connecting with the Next .

Alan Lazaros 36:46

Level family . We mean it when we say family . If you ever need anything , please reach out to us directly . Everything you need to get a hold of us is in the show notes .

Kevin Palmieri 36:55

Thank you again and we will talk to you tomorrow . You .