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I'll wait.

Okay, this isn't awkward at all.

(box rustles)

(tape rasps)

(paper cover rasping)

This might go down as the first unboxing video

in my channel's history.

(tape rasps)

It reminds me of like batting cages, growing up.

That's like nostalgia, okay cool, great.

(upbeat ambient music)

- Get in there.

There we go.

So we have been in lockdown here in Sydney

for the past seven weeks,

which means that I haven't worked out in seven weeks.

And so I got a yoga mat because I'm gonna do yoga.

I've never done yoga before.

I'm excited for it

and that also means that I'm gonna do it for 30 days.

Cause my name's Matt D'Avella

and that's what I do when I try new things.

But also I'm gonna make a video about it

and I'm gonna kick up these 30-day experiments again.

There's so much fun stuff that I wanna try,

but that's not really the topic of this video.

I wanted to talk about regrets because, my God

do I have regrets.

So it's basically become a self-development cliche

at this point, but it's been said that at the end

of our lives,

we're not gonna regret the things that we did.

We'll regret the things that we didn't do

unless of course, you murder somebody (chuckles)

because then if that's you,

if that's what you've done and shame on you,

that was a really bad thing to do,

you might actually regret the things you did,

but for the most of us,

I would say that we're gonna regret

the shots that we didn't take.

And even now, you know, I'm not in my 90s yet,

but when I look back over my life,

the biggest regret that I have is

that I let fear control me.

Now don't get me wrong.

I don't stay awake at night

having these regrets thinking about,

"Oh man, I should've done this.

I should've done that."

I tend to let the past go and move on.

But for the sake of sharing advice to somebody

that's maybe a little bit younger than me,

maybe has a little bit less back problems than me.

If you're in your early 20s, mid-20's, actually,

I don't even care.

I don't care how old you are.

This advice is applicable,

but it certainly would be great to catch you

while you're young.

That sounds creepy, "To catch you while you're young."

Oh my goodness.

Please don't take that out of context.

If I could go back to a younger version of myself,

I would just dial up the amount of courage

that I had just by a little bit

because much throughout my adolescence,

as well as all throughout my 20's,

I really, for the most part let feel fear

make decisions for me.

I had the fear of putting myself on camera

because I was worried about failing publicly.

I had the fear that my freelance filmmaking clients

would find out that

I was still living in my parents' basement.

There were actually a couple occasions

where my clients asked me if they could come

to my studio to check out my editing process.

And I had to say, "Yeah, let me just, let me ask my mom."

And I think above all of these fears was

my fear to push myself outside of my comfort zone.

I was afraid of trying new things

of going to that yoga class,

of meeting new people, of trying breath work.

There were all these things that were new and scary.

I was really afraid of failing.

And the funny thing about fear

is that it's really difficult to see

from the outside because we're so good

at coming up with excuses.

Instead of starting that business,

we convince ourselves that it's far more safe and secure

to continue to work at that mid-level paper company

in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

Instead of asking that girl or boy out,

we convince ourselves of all the reasons

why it would never work with them.

The first half of my twenties,

I was too afraid to go on a single date,

literally from 20 to 25, I could not get over that fear.

And so I would,

I would try, I would go on online dating apps.

I would chat for sometimes up to a month at a time.

And then once it would get to the point

where they would send me their phone number,

I would ghost them.

I would just not respond.

And I'm certainly not proud of the fact that I did that.

And I ghosted many people,

but it was that fear that consumed me.

I was afraid of what might happen

after we got through those initial pleasantries.

I was afraid of that awkward silence,

the deafening awkward silence.

I think above all, I was afraid of rejection

of being hurt and being cast away.

And so instead of facing that fear,

I turned inward and I focused on my work

and I came up with all the excuses in the world

for why I wasn't ready to date

or why I kept flaking on these people.

But here's the big problem that I've found about fear

is that if you do not face it,

if you do not confront these demons,

they will get bigger and bigger as time goes on.

I would say in my early 20s, it was a nervousness,

like maybe a little bit of gentle anxiety about dating.

But since I kept neglecting it every month,

every year, it compounded over and over again

to the point when I was 25, I moved to New York City

and I finally said, "Okay, this is it.

I'm gonna do it.

I'm gonna face my fears.

I'm gonna put myself out there.

I'm gonna go on a date."

I had a severe panic attack in the shower

as I was getting ready to go on that date.

I remember hyperventilating.

It was difficult to even understand

what was going on

'cause I'd never been through anything

like that before.

I didn't really see myself as somebody

who was shy or had anxiety up until that point

because I had buried it down so deep.

And then finally it all came out.

And so that was a lesson to me

to not let things go unhealed or unresolved

for a significant period of time.

And when we let fear win,

we really miss out on so much in life.

I think the problem that we've run into

with all these scenarios

is that we're not allowing ourselves

to be a beginner and to have a beginner's mindset.

It's kind of crazy when you think about it

because we have to be a beginner, at some point,

whether it's dating or doing yoga,

if we're pushing ourselves out of our comfort zone,

if we're trying something new,

of course we are gonna have moments

where we have no idea what we're doing

and we need to embrace that.

We need to accept the fact that we're not perfect.

We're gonna make mistakes.

If we wanna try standup comedy,

we're gonna bum the first time.

If we're gonna try yoga, our pants might split

in the middle of class and that's okay.

We have to be willing to lean into that

to be able to move forward and to grow.

But here's the thing, there is no dial that you can turn up.

There's no pill that you can swallow

to help you have more courage.

Although a couple shots of tequila won't hurt,

but the truth is that courage is taking action

in the face of fear.

And so being afraid is okay,

it's okay to be afraid of these things

and to worry and to wonder what might happen

and to live with that uncertainty.

But really if you're gonna have any fear,

it should be that you won't live up to your potential,

that you'll never take any risks

and that you'll look back on your life with regret.

Okay, it is time to do yoga.

(upbeat music)

Hey, how about this?

I'm making videos every week again.

It's been a really long time since I've done this,

but it feels really good to be diving back in

and making videos more consistently.

I hope you guys have been digging these videos as well.

You can expect to see a new video every Wednesday.

Going forward, he says as his video gets uploaded

on Thursday, if you've got any ideas

for future 30-day challenges, let me know.

I'm thinking of trying out veganism, zero waste,

maybe even van life.

Let me know down in the comments below

what you want me to try out.

Alrighty, I'll catch you guys next week.

Hopefully I don't rip a whole in my (cracks)

shit.