Do your regrets change before and after you die? As an English psychic healer, I’ve found they do. For over a decade, I’ve helped clients through the period when a loved one is dying and through the grief that follows their death.
Being psychic, I hear, see, smell and feel the spirit world. When someone passes over, they become a bit lighter energetically, but their personality doesn’t really change. My dad is still my dad.
Over the years I’ve heard the same regrets come up in conversations with my Dad and my clients’ loved ones in spirit. Before Dad died, he talked about the career he wish he’d had. After he died, he kept bringing up the flowers he wish he bought my Mum. What troubles someone just after they die can look quite different to them years later.
The Top Five Regrets of the Dying
In her book The Top Five Regrets of the Dying, Hay House author Bronnie Ware writes about the people she cared for in their last weeks of life. The five regrets that came up again and again were:
- People wished they’d made their own choices instead of doing what others expected.
- They regretted giving so much time to work.
- They regretted keeping their feelings to themselves.
- They regretted letting important friendships slip away.
- They wished they’d given themselves permission to be happier.
“What Have I Done With My Life?”
Dad was 68 when he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a few days before my daughter was born. Over the years he was in and out of hospital undergoing treatment. One evening, walking home from a family celebration for his 75th birthday, he said to me, “What have I done with my life?” He felt he had nothing to show for it. Nothing of merit. Nothing to be proud of.
I reminded him he had a wife and three children who loved him. Through his work at the bank he’d helped people build businesses. He’d been a school governor and helped disabled people in his community. Dad had into banking a job and money. On that walk home, what he regretted was giving up on his dream of a career in agriculture.
After Dad died, it was flowers he kept talking to me about. Whenever I was going to see Mum, he’d ask me to buy her some. He regretted buying her last-minute birthday and Valentine’s flowers from the local garage. I used to laugh and tell him that if he brought me more Reiki training clients, I’d buy a bigger bunch. Over the years, those requests faded.
It’s close to nine years since Dad died. His energy is lighter now than when he first went across.
Six Regrets of the Dead
I’ve noticed the longer people are in heaven, the more pragmatic they are about their lives. They realise they had bills to pay to earn and responsibilities. Most were doing the best they could with the choices they had at the time. Some can also see how much their own hurt or unresolved issues influenced choices they later regretted.
I’ve also noticed the changes in how they talk about old friends. Before they died, they might have regretted losing touch with someone special. After death they can see how it happened more easily. Perhaps they used to go out a lot with a friend from work when they were both single. Once they had children, they found themselves spending more time with another parent. They see it happening in our lives down here too, and they’re a little kinder about how it happened in their own life.
Six regrets in particular stand out from my conversations with Dad and my clients’ loved ones in spirit.
Regret 1. Not Making Their Wishes Clear Before Death
With my dad, we managed to organise a will and sort out the bank accounts, but he did not want to discuss his funeral. We did not know whether he wanted to be buried or cremated, or what he would want done with his ashes. His answers were usually “Whatever”, “I’m not that bothered ” or “It won’t matter once I’m gone”. He was frightened of dying, which had come from his Catholic upbringing of a harsh judgemental God – heaven or hell.
He eventually had a church funeral followed by cremation. Through his work as a county councillor, he had helped secure planning permission for the crematorium. On the day of my Dad’s funeral, he told me wryly that he had not expected to become one of its clients.
Afterwards, my brother and mum considered scattering his ashes at sea or over a field. Dad was shocked by the idea. He wanted something to show he had been here. I didn’t want to upset my family, so I said that it was me who needed a gravestone; somewhere I could visit and grieve. Over the years, Mum has wondered why I rarely go when it mattered so much to me at the time.
In my readings I’ve heard other wishes, from a plaque on a bench in a favourite park to a small memorial in a scout hut. If there’s a place you’d like to leave your name, where loved one can visit if they wish, tell them whilst you’re here.
Regret 2. Not Giving Their Dreams a Chance
Dad wanted to work in agriculture in developing countries. When he failed his first year at university and then the resit, he gave up on that dream. Years later, when we were little, he tried again. He applied speculatively for jobs as an agricultural sales representative, got one interview and stopped applying when he didn’t get the job.
That was hard for me to understand. As a young boy with polio, Dad had spent a year in hospital. His family would visit and wave to him through the window. He’d been told he’d never walk again, yet he did. On that walk home from his birthday, I heard how much that missed chance still mattered to him. Even now, when we talk, Dad regrets that he didn’t have the faith or courage to keep trying. His family and friends knew he’s gone for the job and he felt ashamed that he hadn’t got it.
Regret 3. Not Spending More Time With the Right People
Dad used to go to the pub after work and spend hours there. The longer he’s been in heaven, the more he’s regretted those hours he could have spend with us.
We can only sleep in one bed, sit on one sofa and drive one car at a time. Yet it’s easy to work extra hours to buy things, then spend more of our time cleaning them or finding somewhere to put them.
Sometimes it’s the people we love most who are easiest to put off. We know they’ll understand if we say, “I’ll come and see you next week.” If someone came to mind as you read that, perhaps that’s who you’d like to see this week.
Regret 4. Not Appreciating Life or Showing Enough Love
I always knew my dad loved me. He rarely said it out loud, but he’d sign his cards “Love Dad x”. Over the years, thanks to my youngest brother’s influence on my parents, Dad got into the habit of kissing us on the cheek or giving us a hug when we visited. Before he died, Dad said to me, “You and your daughter are so precious to me.” He said it twice, on two separate occasions. Both times it took me by surprise. It was so unlike Dad to say something like that. After he died we discovered he’d kept the Christmas and birthday cards he’d received over the last few years. That was unusually for him.
Just after Dad passed, he told me he wished he’d said to his family more often how much he loved us. Years on, when we talk about it, he wishes he’d bought us a few special, timeless gifts instead of giving us money or just another present. Something we’d still have today that he’d chosen for us. Dad knows life moves on. He loves us so dearly, and he doesn’t want to be forgotten.
Regret 5. Not Saying Sorry or Showing More Grace
Some people knew perfectly well, whilst they were alive they were in the wrong. They knew they were causing someone pain. They were too stubborn, too bloody-minded or too selfish to say sorry. What they regret now is that the person they hurt never got to hear them say, “I knew I was wrong, and I’m sorry I hurt you.”
Sometimes it was the other way round. Someone they loved made a mistake and they held it against them. Now they wish they’d been a little more forgiving and given them a little more grace when they got something wrong. We all make mistakes. Sometimes pride gets in the way. Sometimes we become so determined to be right that we stop listening. We can recognise that an argument matters less than the relationship and still speak up when someone has hurt us.
Regret 6. Not Setting Up a Way to Say Hello Before They Died
One regret I hear from people in spirit is that they wish they’d agreed on a way to say hello before they left. They still visit the people they love. They wish they’d said, “When you notice this, you’ll know it’s me.”
Whilst you’re both here, ask, “How will I know it’s you?” If your mum always wears the same perfume, you might agree that catching the scent of her favourite scent will be her way of saying hello. Or perhaps you will agree to her favourite song, which when it “pops in your head”, she will be telling you she is with you.
Say Hello
You can start the conversation yourself, too. If your dad was always the first one up, keep his photograph near the kettle. When you make your first drink of the day, tell him what you’re up to that day. If the garden was where you and your mum used to sit and talk, take your tea out there and have a word with her.
In some of my readings, loved ones in spirit have even let me know where they’d like their photograph. Some prefer the room where the family gathers to a spot beside the bed. They see the bedroom as your private space. Their personalities still come through, right down to where they’d like their picture.
Sometimes you simply sense them around you. You might be sitting on your own and suddenly feel surrounded by love, or feel a coolness on your arm, like someone gently stroking it. That touch can be a hello as well.
Expert Tip They love it when we say mentally say hello to them when we know they are near by their scent, favourite song or simply the strong feeling of their presence. When we say hello back to them, it uplifts their energy, sheer happiness in being recognised with love radiating from them, When they are happy it ripples out to us, just like when we are happy it makes them feel more cheerful.
The next time you’re putting the kettle on and you catch the scent of your mum’s favourite perfume, say what you’d have said if she’d just walked into your kitchen. “Hello, Mum. I’m just making a brew. A bit stronger than you like!”
What Can We Do With These Reflections?
When my dad asked what he had done with his life, he could see the dream he had missed more clearly than the lives he had touched. I could see things he was overlooking. That conversation reminds me that reflecting on regret needs compassion as well as honesty.
There may be something we still want to change. There may also be more to value in the life we have already lived than we realise. Perhaps there is a conversation to have, a friend to contact, a wish to make clear or a dream to give a little more time.
We cannot know how long our candle will burn. But we can consider what we want to do with the light we have.
