Lewis Howes | How to Overcome the Fear of Death

Lewis Howes - Show Gratitude

In this motivational video, former professional football player and author Lewis Howes shares a near death experience he had while undergoing surgery and the important lesson that came out of it.

Transcript:

I was never this scared in my entire life until I went into the surgery room. I was terrified of being put under, and going through this. I just didn't know if I was gonna make it. I had no clue.

But I knew I needed surgery, and I got more terrified when they put the gown on me, and they put me on the bed, and they started carting me into this room, and I remember the room opening, and it was this big white room with a metal table, and they lift me off, and put me on this table, and I'm just trembling and shaking at this point, and there's six or seven doctors around me, and I'm like, this could be it. This could be the last thing I see, for all I know.

And I remember being shaking so much I couldn't breathe and calm down, so they had an IV in me, they put some calming medicine in me or something, and said a few words, and they're like, you're about to go to sleep, so I remember, the next thing I remember is being in a hospital bed, waking up to this beeping sound, this beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, like I didn't know what was happening. All of a sudden the nurse is shaking me and saying Lewis you need to wake up, wake up, you need to wake up. And I'm hearing this beeping and I'm like what is going on, am I alive, am I dead? I'm just like, I had morphine running through me I had no clue what was happening.

And it felt so good to go back to sleep. Like I just wanted to sleep and so I would relax. After a few minutes she'd wake me up, I wouldn't open my eyes but I was awake and then I'd just kinda of slowly wanna go back to sleep and she'd keep shaking me. This happened for about an hour where I'd fall asleep, the beeping sound would go off, I'd wake up scared but I just wanted to sleep. And it wasn't until the moment they brought my girlfriend in at the time, where she came and she grabbed my hand and said I'm here, I got you, when I started to feel at peace and I started to slowly wake up and open my eyes.

But I just remember feeling terrified that this could be my last moments and have no clue what was going on. My grandfather passed away years ago and I was close with him but I felt like I had a great relationship, and you know, a great 25 years of life with him where I don't think I missed out on something. It was just his time, but this is a fear of mine is that I am really close to a lot of people and it's just inevitable that someone's gonna die at some point, you know, and it maybe sooner or later and so that's something I haven't faced adversity with yet in that part of my life.

And that's why I really try to appreciate and show gratitude to everyone in my life in a moment. You know, at the end of every one of my episodes I acknowledge my guests. You know, I'm trying to acknowledge people as often as possible 'cause I don't wanna something to happen where their not around and I say to myself, man I never shared with them how much I appreciated or how grateful I am for our relationship. That's why for me I'm always trying to live in that place of gratitude and appreciation because they could be gone at any moment.