What's #1 on Your Bucket List?

 If you have ever seen the movie THE BUCKET LIST with Morgan Freeman, you might remember that his character who was dying of cancer decided to write his final desires which enticed his fellow roommate, played by Jack Nicholson to join him in adding a few items of his own before his own demise.

It's rather a shame to list those items which are meaningful to achieve in one's lifetime only when a crisis occurs or you feel that there is far too little time on the horizon. Why not encourage everyone to begin a bucket list as soon as they are old enough to realize what matters? If we begin a list early in life, we can always revise it, cross some things off we have achieved or believe are no longer important and add others which we are passionate about.

Maybe we should perhaps have a weekly or even daily bucket list review with some small steps encouraging us to pursue at least some morsel of the things we really want to do regularly. Do you want a new career? Then what are you doing now to save some money or invest some time in the pursuit of that goal? Want to build your dream house on a lake? Have you begun looking at potential places and cutting out pictures of what you hope you will have down the road? Do you want to raise your children with a sense of responsibility and purpose? Then have you taken the time to introduce them to another's needs? Or if they are even too young for that, have you assigned them specific chores they need to attend to without your constant nagging and reminders? Do you want to be the size you were in college? Have you committed to some daily exercise and limiting your sweet tooth? Do you hope to repair that relationship that has gone sour? Have you tried to write a letter or make a phone call and begin the steps to work things out?

Once you have a bucket list, then what you do seems to have meaning and purpose in attempting to achieve it,if you can direct your energies, and resources or time to realizing there is a means to an end. Even if you are no longer a youth, surely you still have some goals you really hope to accomplish in your lifetime and perhaps if you don't get to accomplish everything, if you leave your list as part of your legacy, someone you love will follow it through for you!

My bucket list? Well, I wanted to rescue more dogs and I now have and I wanted to get all my children within a 100 miles of where I live and this summer my son moved closer, and I wanted to earn my living writing and speaking and I have had an amazing adventure in that arena and well, I still want to see Bora Bora and Fiji and bike the entire Cape Cod Rail Trail and...

Making a bucket list might be an amazing way to discover your passion and find the fire that will start you in a direction you only hoped to someday go!

What's on YOUR BUCKET LIST? 

"Have you found joy in your life?" "Has your life brought joy to others?" From the movie, The Bucket List

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What More Do You Need?

Seems like there was always one thing I wish I had more of. Maybe it depended on what particular goal I was trying to achieve but I often found myself wishing even plotting to get more of whatever I needed(wanted).

When I was a young mother, I definitely remember wishing I had more sleep. Obviously many new parents can relate to suddenly finding yourself overwhelmed with responsibilities but being sleep deprived constantly. Later in life, I recall wishing I had more "me" time. I most certainly had time to sleep then, but my days were often consumed with all the activities having a family can bring. Somehow I believed an extra hour, day etc. would afford me whatever time I had deprived myself of in the midst of raising a family.

I can certainly relate to wishing I had more money. Especially when the hot water tank and roof decided to leak simultaneously. I can recall wishing I had more disposable income to travel, expand my business, buy eye candy etc whenever most of the income went to children's braces, sports activities, college funds, groceries and "everything else."

Have you ever told yourself if you simply had more _________ (time, money, energy, patience,contacts, knowledge etc) you would certainly be able to reach your goals? While there is little doubt having more of whatever we might be feeling is diminished could be the bonus that puts us over the top, often we use this as an excuse for not executing our plans. We turn our fear of taking the first step into a surreal scenario convincing ourselves our efforts might be futile unless we have 'more'. 

I know having more sleep would not have made me a better new mother. Yes, a more patient and probably more cheerful new mother but the internal desire to be the best mother I could be went deeper than the difference a few hours of sleep would have ever make. Having more disposable income would not have made me a better business owner. It may have afforded me the ability to expand or update but the passion to be a dedicated and exceptional business owner could not be compromised with more or less money.Certainly having more time might make me feel more productive but  like most people, I work best with an organized  and predictable schedule so I might actually be less productive with a 25th hour added to every day.

I have also realized we will always want 'more'. We live in a world where new ideas sprout new products constantly and we are constantly bombarded with the latest and greatest new invention to make our lives easier. Wanting 'more' is not wrong unless it is used as an excuse for why we can't move on with our dreams and passions. 

I often look at the words framed in my office..."happiness is wanting what you have not having what you want." and I realize many great ideas were started with far than ideal resources. If you wait until you have enough_______(time, money, energy, patience, contacts, knowledge etc.) you will never start because 'enough' like 'more' is relative and elusive.

What is the one thing you wish you had more of ? 

Is your need for 'more' the excuse you use for not starting your dream?

Begin Where You Began

The past few days, I have been on a nostalgia trip to my roots. I highly recommend  anyone who wants to really confirm a passion return to the places that made you who you are. Here's a few things I learned while visiting where I had been to help me understand where I am headed.

In returning to the town where I spent nearly all of my young life, I realized I did not need much to make me happy; people who loved me and helped me grow good roots were the essentials I required in a small town where everyone knew one another's name. The small dock where I wrote in my diaries or completed high school essays might have been replaced by a larger platform for countless boaters but it was "home" to me for nearly 2 decades.

Visiting where I got my degrees revealed many things. As I took a picture of the long hallway in a building where I stood before a list of Bio majors and realized I had no passion for Pre-Med, I also realized I could replace one dream with another and had more resilience than I might have imagined. Walking through another building where I spent countless clinical hours and handed in more research papers than I dreamed possible, confirmed my love for communication and my commitment to wanting people to share their emotions, opinions, dreams and stories in any way possible.

High above a city where my soul mate once asked me to spend the rest of my life with him, I knew I could make life changing decisions with little more than my heart and soul to guide me. I also knew I had made one of the best ones of my life when I said, "yes!" It wasn't Paris but it still held me in awe looking at a full moon and hundreds of lights twinkling on the water.

Taking a drive past two homes where we raised our children revealed my ability to stay determined and yet flexible when obstacles came my way. There were the handprints from all of us in the driveway; proof that regardless of where one ends up, families are forever. In those homes, I wrote in journals for each child as they grew and developed into their own persons hoping to preserve every memory of their childhood.

Stopping by the building which housed my first office demonstrated my persistence for following my dreams to "start something," as well as my ability to face competition,change when things needed changing and never stop learning something new. It was here I churned out countless evaluations and recommendations for others who needed intervention or a change in direction.

Spending time with friends who knew me in good times and bad revealed the importance of having people in your life who inspire, encourage, support and love  unconditionally. Those who were sure I would "write something someday," perhaps knew far better than I did, what I might be capable of doing with their support. They heard me when I talked but also understood me when I could not communicate with words. It was then and continues to be an amazing blessing.

More than a walk down memory lane, beginning where you began offers insight and perspective about where you are or should be headed. Whether you have had a wonderful or horrible past, your direction and dreams were impacted by what you learned and how you handled the situation. It's still a learning process for me, but from baby books and thesis's to blog posts and published books, I wrote things down for others to remember and still do. Bits and pieces of people and places all added or subtracted from my life infusing it in ways I might seldom have realized.

People often ask me when I learned I wanted to be a writer, but like many passions, putting feelings and observations into words and capturing experiences in so many sentences for posterity seemed to find me rather than the other way around. 

Sometimes our passions are not so much what we do but what we become as a result of where we have been.
Maybe the same is true for you, but regardless, whether you take a real or virtual trip down memory lane, I encourage you to discover the fuel your passion needs from the people, places and experiences that made you who you are.

What would a trip back to your roots tell you about who you are now?

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