Die Empty

a note on living by Derek Sivers

I recently came across a note by Derek Sivers on living. His note posited that the way to live is to aim to die empty.

A burial ground contains a library of unfinished books, he says. Startup ideas that remained churning inside their heads.

They never gave themselves a shot.

In Derek’s words, “most people die with everything still inside of them.”

We can’t die with regrets. We can’t die as what-ifs. We can’t die with a billion imaginations screaming within.

They have to exist. It is only through our creations that we can actively carve our reality. Our imagination, when it exists, turns us into active agents affecting our reality.

Humans in 2025 are passive agents in the global capitalist order. We’re consumers being moulded by organisations, algorithms, and industrial ecosystems. Can we live like this? Worse, can we die like this? As lab rats? for INSTAGRAM’s AD ALGORITHMS??

We cannot. We must not. This is why we must create. We must follow our instincts, our tastes, no matter how far removed they are from the mainstream. Far from the trends. The algo.

It is in this striving that the difference lies. The difference between a creator and a consumer.

The difference between those who die with a body and mind flooded with possibilities, and those who die empty, because their possibilities are already out there, changing the reality for those who still exist.

Who would you want to be?

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Additionally, here are some lines from Sivers’s note that stayed with me:

Don’t wait for inspiration.
Inspiration will never make the first move.
She comes only when you’ve shown you don’t need her.
Do your work every day, no matter what.

Suspend all judgment when creating the first draft.
Just get to the end.
It’s better to create something bad than nothing at all.
You can improve something bad.
You can’t improve nothing.

Most of what you make will be fertilizer for the few that turn out great.
But you won’t know which is which until afterward.
Keep creating as much as you can.

Creativity is a magic coin.
The more you spend, the more you have.

Embrace what’s weird about you, and use it to create.
Never think you need to be normal or perfect.
Flawless people don’t need to make art.

Explore whatever excites you most.
If you’re not excited by it, your audience won’t be either.

Imitate your heroes.
It’s not copying because it won’t be the same.
Your imitation of anything will be unrecognizably warped by your own twisted perspective.
Most creations are new combinations of existing ideas.
Originality just means hiding your sources.

You reference creations from the past to make your own unique addition or combination.
The dialog can span centuries.

You send important messages to those who can hear it.

When your creation is good enough, let it go.
Release it, so it can go out into the world, without you.
It can join the conversation, and others can improve it.

Separate creation and release.
When you’ve finished a work, wait a while before you release it to the world.
By then, you’re on to something new.
The public comments won’t affect you, since they will be about your past work.

Consider creating under a pseudonym.
This will help you know that criticism is not about you, just something you made.

If you are proud of what you made, it was a success.
The less you please everyone else, the more you please your fans.
Real success comes not from the crowd, but from feeling proud.

Let the deadline of death drive you.
Create until your last breath.
Let your last spark of life go into your work.
Die empty, so death takes only a corpse.

When you’re gone, your work shows who you were.
Not your intentions.
Not what you took in.
Only what you put out.