Name: The Top Regret of Dying People
Uploaded: 2024-10-17T17:56:10.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'The Top Regret of Dying People' from Theo Von Clips on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-10-17. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'The Top Regret of Dying People' from Theo Von Clips on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-10-17. Transcript available.

- There was a study done in Australia,
or at least I used to work in palliative care
as a doctor looking after dying people.
In Australia, there was a palliative care nurse
who wrote a book called
The Top Five Regrets of Dying People.
These are people that were dying before that time,
like I used to look after,
of cancer or chronic neurological illness.
You know what the top regret of dying people was?
That they didn't have the courage to be themselves.
And the third top regret was
that they didn't have the courage to express their emotions.
They pretended to be happy when they were not and so on.
So the question for the rest of us is
do we want to wait till some terminal illness wakes us up?
Or should we just confront the fact
that in so many ways we're afraid to be authentic
'cause we're so afraid of being rejected.
And as children, we didn't have much choice.
As adults, can we develop that freedom to be ourselves?
- Wow, yeah, it's amazing what your feelings or your heart
or your mind will like want you to do sometimes.
But then this other smoke comes in this.
- Yeah.
- That feels stronger sometimes.
And it clouds, it almost clouds that feeling away.
- Yeah, but it does.
- Yeah, it's funny, a few years ago I thought it's like,
I'm kind of a late bloomer.
Like I only realized that,
like I go to recovery meetings and stuff like that, I'm in AA.
And I only realized a few years ago it started to hit me like,
did I even want to be a comedian?
- Huh.
- Or did I just at some early point
develop having to get attention?
- Yeah.
- Because I need, you know, and then,
so if that's the case, then who did I really want it?
What, you know, who would, what would I have been?
- Yeah.
- If I didn't do that, and not saying that,
not saying that I'm not grateful
and I don't love being a comedian.
- Yeah.
- It's been, it's been a blessing, but, but it's like,
if I created that.
- Yeah.
- Okay, I have to be this thing to, for you to see me,
then who created that, you know?
Like who, like was there a different me
that was supposed to be there, but then I created this.
- Well, that's the dilemma for so many of us is that,
as a result of childhood wounding,
we have to make ourselves into something
that the world will accept and value.
Like, look, in my case, I love having been a physician,
and that's my calling, but the big part of it wasn't just
that I wanted to help humanity or heal people,
it's also needed to be important.
Now, why do they need to be important?
'Cause as an infant, I got the message that I wasn't.
- Yeah.
- And so now then, and that creates a kind of an addiction,
'cause you have to keep proving to yourself
how important you are and how valuable you are,
but nobody should have to prove how valuable they are.
That's just our birthright, that we exist.
We have the right to be here.
- It's funny people say a figment of your imagination.
That's almost what I was sometimes.
I felt like I was something that my mind,
or that my soul or whatever had created to best face.
- Persona.
- Yes.
- Did you ever read Pinocchio as a kid?
- Oh yeah, Geppetto, dude.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Now, do you remember what,
when Pinocchio becomes a real boy,
and he looks at his puppet self and he says,
"I was so foolish when I was a puppet."
- Right.
- But we're also foolish when we're puppets.
We're not stupid.
- Right.
- But we're unaware.
- Yeah.
- You know?
- Yeah, unaware.
Sometimes I always feel like I have to explain my intentions.
There's a part of me that always feels
like I'm manipulating somebody.
Do you know what I'm talking about?
- That's not a feeling.
- So what is it, it's a thought?
- It's a belief.
- It's a belief.
- Yeah, no, and there's a reason why you have it.
Like, even if I'm just doing something nice,
there's a part of me that's like, oh, you're--
- Yeah, you think you're a fake.
- Yeah.
- Yeah, it's called the imposter syndrome.
- Okay.
- And it has to do with the fact
that you couldn't be real as a kid.
In some ways, you had to pretend.
And it's really hard to let go of that,
of that sense that I'm still doing it.
- Yeah.
- It's what you grew up with.
So you could be kind to that part of yourself.
- Okay.
- The part that you could actually,
'cause it's not a feeling, Theo, it's a belief.
And the beliefs can be, you don't argue with feelings,
but beliefs you can challenge.
Is it really true that you're manipulating?
Like when you're talking to me now,
are we having a genuine conversation?
- I believe that we are.
- Or is it true that you're actually manipulating me
in any way at all?
- No, I don't think I am.
- And furthermore, give me some credit.
- Maybe you can't manipulate me even if you wanted to.
So, that fear of yours is both a lack of compassion
towards yourself and a lack of, in a sense,
trusting the other person's capacity to look after themselves.
- That's a good point.
- Yeah, yeah, it's just funny.
I was just talking with my brother yesterday,
'cause we had similar childhoods and we were thinking of,
well, what are some things that I could think about
to talk with him about?
And we were talking about that,
that sometimes we always feel like there's something,
well, like we're manipulating ourselves,
or that our ability to manipulate would be so powerful
that we wouldn't even know what we're doing,
which is pretty crazy too.
- It's a lack of self-trust.
- It's a lack of self-trust.
- Now, you know what?
Have I manipulated?
Yes, I have.
- Yeah, sure.
- You know?
But there's not a question that one never does it,
but I know when I'm manipulating.
- Right.
- And usually it's 'cause I want something
that I don't know how to state directly,
where I'm afraid that I might not get otherwise,
you know?
And then I'm afraid to show up with my vulnerable request.
- Which would make sense as a child,
there was something you wanted that you didn't think
you were going to get otherwise.
- That's right.
- So you didn't show, so it makes sense.
- Children manipulate out of a sense of weakness.
And that's pretty much all they can do
if otherwise they don't get their needs met.
Thank you.