July 2019
The average human life lasts 650,000 hours. How will you spend yours?
Traveling tops most bucket lists—and Alaska is one of the most-desired destinations. This shot is from Eagle River, about 40 minutes from Anchorage.
What Are People’s Greatest Regrets (And How Can You Avoid Them)?
Imagine that you’re dying. Cheery thought, right? Ask yourself this: Looking back at your life, what would be your biggest regret?
Bronnie Ware, a longtime palliative care nurse in Australia, found that as patients confronted death, their chief regret was living the life that was expected of them, not the life they wanted. They died regretting their unfulfilled dreams, “knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made,” wrote Ware in a post on patients’ five most common regrets. Research from Cornell University in 2018 found similar results. For most participants, their biggest regret was not living up to their ideal selves—they had passed on opportunities or failed to pursue their passions.
Why talk about regrets? Because visualizing regrets can help us rethink our lives. A few months ago, I wrote a piece on Warren Stortroen, 86, a former insurance agent in Minnesota. Warren wanted to see the world and since retiring in 1996 he has volunteered 100+ times on scientific projects with Earthwatch, from Norway to Nicaragua. Another example is Robert Field, who traded a career in big business to become a fisherman. “I didn’t want to spend my life chasing money, building a bank account so I can be happy when I’m 65,” he said in a recent Men’s Health profile. “I’d rather be broke and wake up every day stoked about what I’m about to do.”
Regrets aren’t just about adventures. Lydia Sohn, a minister in San Diego, interviewed people age 90-99 and found that their biggest regret involved relationships. They wished they had bonded more with their kids and spent more time with people they loved.
“It’s not the things we do in life that we regret on our deathbed. It is the things we do not,” said computer science professor Randy Pausch, whose “last lecture” while dying of pancreatic cancer led to a bestselling book and a viral YouTube video. But as Warren shows, it’s never too late. His advice for life? Be a doer, not a watcher. Which is also a good way to avoid regrets. —Ken Budd
See The World
Want to be a citizen scientist while you travel? Here’s how you can help scientific orgs, reports Alyson Krueger in The Washington Post. (And yes, that's me, far left, on a scientific trip in Ecuador.)
Feeling stupid is good: Every time I feel dumb while traveling, I learn something. David G. Allan explains why travel makes you wiser for CNN and Jonathan Arlan writes about the upsides of travel humiliations for the Los Angeles Times.
Plus: Concerns about traveling given its impact on global warming (Andy Newman, The New York Times), an interview with Barack Obama on why travel matters (BBC.com), plus visiting the Grand Tetons off-season and what’s new in D.C. (stories I wrote for AARP).
Live Your Best Life
Spending two hours a week in nature can boost our health, a new study shows—though really, to me, two hours doesn’t seem like enough (Maureen O'Hare, CNN.com).
From lower stress levels to better brain circuitry: Six reasons why you should be reading books every day (Christina DesMarais, Inc.).
Plus: The case for doing nothing (Olga Mecking, The New York Times), profound advice for creating “a reverse bucket list” (Arthur C. Brooks for The Atlantic in a piece on career decline), and why kindness makes you healthier (Chrystle Fiedler, Next Avenue) and even slows the aging process (Tom Jacobs, Pacific Standard).
Meet Amazing People
After the death of her mother, Mary Latham has spent the last three years driving across America, searching for random acts of kindness (Heather McElhatton, MRPNews.org).
The survivors of the California wildfires endured terrible losses, but many gained something surprising as well (Martin Kuz, The Christian Science Monitor).
James Neal has donated not one organ but two. "If you're able to help somebody, do it," he says (CBS News).
Photo of the Month
My friend Steve Szewczyk shot this on a recent trip with his family to Zion National Park. Shooting the Milky Way required some improvisation: He made a tripod out of rocks.