“In previous times, the pain of my past had worn me down to such a place that I had withdrawn a long way into myself. It was the misled belief many people experience that if you keep people out, you keep the pain out. You stop yourself from being hurt even more. If no one can get close, then no one can hurt you anymore either. Of course the only real way to heal is to let love flow in and through again, not to block it out, but reaching that point can take a long time.”
I am attracted to writers who tell the truth.
The ones who don’t, necessarily, paint an airy-fairy white-picket-fence picture of things.
The ones who make themselves vulnerable.
The ones who teach us something that we didn’t already know. Or realize. Or remember.
This is Bronnie Ware.
The lessons Ms. Ware shares in The Top Five Regrets of the Dying are simple and pure. A beautiful account of her years as a palliative caregiver, Ms. Ware shares the poignant – and sometimes difficult and painful – life lessons her clients came to understand, and share, in their final days.
Along the way, Ms. Ware begins to tell her own story, opening herself up to the reader in new ways in each chapter. While the lessons aren’t new, the stories are. The stories aren’t about fluff, they are about the real stuff. Real life stuff. The joy, the pain, the complication, the simplicity… and the love. The real stuff. It’s not always pretty, but is quite possibly always beautiful. Because it’s real life. And from it, we learn.
That is what this book is about. And that is what makes this book different.
Thank you my dear friends at Hay House for this precious read. I must say that while I love everything Hay House, this book makes my list of absolute favorites. Thank you for finding Bronnie Ware, and thank you for this book. It is a treasure.
