We’ve all heard it. It’s on posters. It’s in song lyrics. It’s that phrase that sounds like something a teenager would post on Instagram after their first breakup: everybody dies but not everyone lives. But if you strip away the Hallmark aesthetic, there is a gritty, uncomfortable truth sitting right in the center of it.
Most of us are just buffering.
You wake up, you check the phone, you drink the coffee, you answer the emails, you eat the sandwich, and you go to bed. Then you do it again. That’s existence. That’s biological maintenance. But it’s not exactly living. Living implies a sort of friction. It’s the difference between being a passenger on a train and actually driving the damn thing.
The phrase is often attributed to various sources, but its most famous modern usage comes from Drake’s "Every Girl," though the sentiment is ancient. It echoes the Stoic philosophers like Seneca, who wrote On the Shortness of Life nearly two thousand years ago. Seneca basically called out the Romans for being "busy" but never actually being "alive." He argued that we aren't given a short life; we make it short by wasting it.
The psychology of the "waiting room"
Psychologists have a term for the state where people just... drift. It’s called "Languishing." Corey Keyes, a sociologist at Emory University, coined the term to describe the middle ground between depression and flourishing. You aren't "sad," but you aren't "thriving" either. You’re just there.
This is the core of why everybody dies but not everyone lives. Languishing is a quiet thief. It doesn’t scream like a mid-life crisis; it just whispers that you can do the things you love later.
Later. The problem is that "later" is a lie. Bronnie Ware, an Australian palliative care nurse, spent years talking to people in their final weeks of life. She compiled her findings into a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying. You know what the number one regret was? "I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me."
That is exactly what it looks like when you die without ever having lived. It’s the realization that you spent your entire cognitive budget on social expectations and safety.
Why we choose "safety" over "living"
Fear. Obviously.
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But it’s a specific kind of fear called "loss aversion." Humans are evolutionarily hardwired to value what they might lose more than what they might gain. We stick to the job we hate because the paycheck is certain. We stay in the city that bores us because we know where the grocery store is.
Staying alive is easy. Evolution has been refining that process for millions of years. Your brain is a survival machine, not a happiness machine. To truly "live," you often have to go against your survival instincts. You have to take risks. You have to be okay with looking like an idiot.
The difference between consumption and contribution
There is a massive trap in the 21st century: we confuse consuming with living.
We think that because we watched a documentary about climbing Everest, we’ve experienced something. We think that because we scrolled through a thousand travel photos, we’ve "seen" the world. This is a digital proxy for life. It provides the dopamine hit of adventure without any of the actual stakes.
In a world where everybody dies but not everyone lives, the people who "live" are usually the ones making things, doing things, and failing at things.
Real living requires agency.
- Active Participation: Instead of watching the game, you play it. Even if you're bad. Especially if you're bad.
- Emotional Vulnerability: Living means letting people see the unpolished version of you. It's risky. It's also the only way to get actual intimacy.
- Curiosity over Certainty: Most people spend their lives trying to be right. Living people spend their lives trying to learn.
Let's look at a real example. Consider the "Blue Zones"—places like Okinawa, Japan, or Sardinia, Italy, where people live remarkably long lives. When researchers like Dan Buettner studied these people, they found that "living" wasn't about extreme sports or huge bank accounts. It was about Ikigai (purpose) and Moai (social circles). These people don't just exist until they’re 100; they are integral parts of their communities until the very end. They are active. They have a reason to get out of bed that isn't just "I have bills."
Breaking the cycle of the "walking dead"
If you feel like you're stuck in the "everybody dies" category and haven't hit the "everyone lives" part yet, you aren't alone. Most of us are stuck there. The modern world is designed to keep us in a state of passive consumption. It's profitable for you to be a bored consumer.
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To break out, you have to audit your time like a forensic accountant.
Where is your energy going? If you spend four hours a day on a screen and then say you "don't have time" to start that side project or learn that instrument or visit that friend, you're lying to yourself. You aren't busy; you’re distracted.
The "not everyone lives" part happens because we think we have an infinite supply of time. We treat our lives like a movie we can pause. But the reel is spinning, and there’s no rewind.
Small shifts that actually matter
You don't need to quit your job and move to a hut in Bali to "live." That's a trope. In fact, a lot of people who do that are just running away from themselves.
Living is about the quality of your attention.
- Stop "waiting" for the weekend. If your life is only tolerable 2 out of every 7 days, you're losing 71% of your existence.
- Identify your "Threshold Moments." These are the times when you have a choice to do the easy thing or the "live" thing. The easy thing is ordering takeout and watching Netflix. The "live" thing is calling a friend to go for a walk or finally starting that book you've been talking about for three years.
- Physicality. We are biological creatures. You cannot "live" entirely in your head or through a screen. You need to move, sweat, and feel the world.
The role of mortality in a meaningful life
It sounds morbid, but the only way to truly live is to keep the fact that you will die in your front pocket.
The Romans called this Memento Mori—"Remember you must die." They didn't do this to be depressing. They did it to create urgency. When you realize that the number of summers you have left is a finite, countable number, you stop wasting them on people you don't like and jobs that don't matter.
Steve Jobs famously said in his 2005 Stanford commencement speech: "Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life."
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He wasn't wrong.
When you frame your choices against the backdrop of your own non-existence, the "scary" stuff—starting a business, asking someone out, moving to a new city—becomes tiny. What's the worst that happens? You fail? You're going to end up in the same place anyway. You might as well have a story to tell before you get there.
Actionable steps to start "living" today
If you want to move from the "existing" column to the "living" column, stop looking for a grand epiphany. It doesn't come. You just have to make different choices.
First, conduct a "Time Audit." For the next three days, track what you do in 30-minute increments. Be brutally honest. If you spent 45 minutes looking at memes, write it down. You will likely find that you are "killing time." But time is the only thing you can't buy back.
Second, define your "Minimum Viable Adventure." What is one thing you’ve been putting off because it feels "extra"? Maybe it’s a weekend hike, a pottery class, or just driving to a part of town you’ve never been to. Do it this week. Not next month. This week.
Third, practice "Digital Fasting." Pick one day a week where you are not a consumer. No social media, no news, no streaming. Spend that time producing something or interacting with the physical world.
Fourth, have the "Hard Conversation." Is there something you’ve been holding back from a partner, a parent, or a boss? Living means being honest about your needs and boundaries. Suppressing your truth is a form of slow-motion dying.
Living isn't a destination. It isn't a retirement goal. It's a muscle. If you don't use it, it atrophies. The reality that everybody dies but not everyone lives isn't a threat; it's an invitation to stop being a spectator in your own life.
Go do something that makes your heart beat a little faster. That’s usually where the "living" starts.