The ultimate way to test desires—especially major life choices such as whether to marry someone or whether to quit your job and start a company—is to practice this same exercise but to do it while imagining yourself on your deathbed. Which choice leaves you more consoled? Which choice causes you more agitation?
Death is very likely the single best invention of life. It is life’s agent of change. It clears out the old to make way for the new. The deathbed is where unfulfilling desires are exposed. Transport yourself there now rather than waiting until later, when it might be too late.
