One of my coworkers asked me the other day, “What is the number one thing on your bucket list?”
One coworker said they wanted to swim with sharks. Another said they wanted to buy a house on the beach in South Carolina and retire there. One girl has an extensive bucket list, detailed with when she wants each to be accomplished.
I on the other hand, was stumped. I’ve never really made a bucket list. Sure there are things that I want to do in life, but I’ve never really thought about those things in detail. I love to travel so I want to travel more, but how do you quantify that? I want to visit so many countries before I die? But then that country becomes a number, and you can’t quantify a culture into a number.
Then that got me thinking about my goals in life. One coworker has a folder on her desktop titled “goals” to remind her every day what she is working for. While I don’t necessarily need explicit goals to work hard and always do my best in whatever I do, I was really inspired by that and really started to consider about the things that I wanted to accomplish in my life.
This took me a long time to put all of these things down. Some of these came easy and some took a lot longer for me to write down. I took things off the list and added things, and couldn’t decide whether to keep some things or not. I didn’t want a bucket list; I wanted an attainable list of goals I want to accomplish within my lifetime.
So after a lot of thought, I’ve finally settled on this list of goals:
I want to have a successful career.
I’m not sure exactly what that looks like as I’m pretty wide open right now as to what I think I want to do. To put that in a more quantifiable form that would baby step me towards reaching that goal, I would like to be in a different position or in a promoted position in three years. I like my department and my coworkers, but there isn’t hardly any growth where I am. It’s the perfect opportunity to gain some experience and to get me to the next step.
I want to own a house.
Andrew and I are in a really good position right now financially as we should be able to pay off all or nearly all of my loans in the next year. We have a few more years renting from Andrew’s mom (for really cheap) so that gives us the opportunity, after paying off my loans, to save for a house. I would like to, in the next five years, own a house.
I want to start a family.
Andrew and I are nowhere ready right now to begin that stage of our life, but eventually I do want to have children. Ideally this would be after we’ve bought a house and are a little more financially stable for children. I’m having some health issues right now that leave things a little up in the air regarding children, but I would also love to adopt. Whatever form this may be in, I want to have a family with Andrew.
I want to live debt-free.
I understand that this may not be in this current moment economically feasible, but I want to, for the majority of my life, not have debt hanging over my head. Andrew and I are on track to have all of our loans paid off within the next year (woot!) and that will be a huge relief! Things will change when we get a house, but I never want to live outside of our means. I don’t need fancy things to be happy and I want that to reflect in our lifestyle.
I want to travel.
I know that this is a pretty broad statement that nearly everyone makes, so I thought I would list the top five places I want to visit before I die (that I’ve not already visited). This was really hard for me to narrow down because I want to go everywhere! But obviously that isn’t really attainable. So after much thought, here is my top five:
- France – perhaps in the countryside or down in the Riviera, I’m not picky!
- Seattle, Washington, USA
- New York City, New York, USA
- New Zealand
- Prague, Czech Republic
I want to always strive to be more like Christ.
I firmly believe that my purpose in life is to glorify God in all that I do, so it would be silly not to include this on my list. Nobody is perfect, let alone me, but that’s no excuse to just do whatever I please. There are so many women in my life that have such pure hearts that are overflowing with kindness, compassion, and a genuine love for the people that are around them that are so encouraging to me in my faith. I never want to lose sight of what is important and want to strive to be more and more like Christ every day, in my words and actions.
I want to always give more than 10%.
Biblically I am called to give at least 10% of my income to the church, which can be hard sometimes, but I love doing. My church helps so many people in our community, and I love knowing that my money is currently putting a dinner on the table for a family who can’t afford groceries this week, or who can’t afford to pay their electric bill. I also love knowing that my money helps fund children’s programs and keeps the building’s doors open so people can have a place to worship.
I want to live a life where I don’t think twice about giving my money to charities and organizations that help others. People are more important than any amount of stuff that I could collect.
So there it is! My fairly simple but written down set of life goals (at least for the moment, haha). Do you guys have a written down list of goals or a bucket list?
You are such a nice person, Becca! I want to meet you offline. LOL.
For some reason, when someone asks me that question, I always say go to Australia or have grandchildren. I want to travel everywhere but there’s something about Australia (maybe being so faraway) that intrigues me. And having grandchildren most likely means I want to get married and have children.
I basically want all what you want like a stable career, own a house and start a family and travel. You haven’t been to NYC? NYC should definitely be your next trip!!
I definitely want to give money to my synagogue and support my community.
You’re a little bit farther in your plan for me because you’re married and I’m still single! LOL.
But I also want to eat more plant based and eventually become vegan as well.
I’ve never put together a bucket list either. I feel like it’s hard to have long term goals because things change and what we want changes. I’m like you and prefer to have a practical list of goals that I can eventually reach
I think you have a great and thoughtful list! I think it’s ok for some things to be open ended because it leaves you room to figure out what feels right as you go. When I first started my career, I did not plan to end up where I am now, but my current position makes me happy. New Zealand is also on my travel list, by the way! It looks gorgeous, and I’d love to see it in person one day.
I also really like your last goal. Every year, I strive to donate more than I did last year and grow that bit by bit. It’s great that you think about others!
Good luck on your goals! It sounds like you already have a good start on them!
I don’t have a bucket list. I tried to make one many years ago but then I realised that I was just adding things to it that I knew I could easily complete… I also haven’t been inspired to make anything like a bucket list. I just want to live a happy life, rather than get caught up in the details.
At some point I want to start a family as well, but I’m certainly not ready for that at this stage of my life. I have my career going so well and I want to keep achieving in that regard, so that’s another one of my goals too.
Debt-free is always a good idea, but it can be challenging. I have a student loan that I will probably have until I’m old… it’s over 30,000 at the moment. I could easily pay it off but Australia has a program where you only pay small parts of it each time you get paid, and you only start to pay it off if you start to earn over a certain amount.
I definitely think people are important but I don’t always donate money – I only donate money if I care about the cause enough. I have participated in lots of fundraising and charity events, and volunteered, and the experience and help I can give is something I prefer to give over money. I think it’s because a lot of organisations don’t really tell you what they do with your money so I get a bit suspicious about just donating money.
Bucketlists are great when you want to measure accomplishments throughout your life. One thing to consider is if something didn’t happen, it’s okay. With you already working as a recent grad, you’re on track to that successful career. Whether or not you decide to stay at the company, you gained valuable experience that serves as a foundation to bigger and better things :).
I actually want to be able to buy a house too! It’s great that the both of you can pay off your loans. That way, you can focus on the better things in life ;). A house is definitely going to be your biggest debt. Good thing you don’t live in LA because houses are expensive here!!! I’m still trying to figure out where I want to live in the near future @__@.
Definitely live your life before having kids. Get all of the selfish things out of your way now (my game plan at the moment, haha). It’s great that you want to align yourself more with the teachings of religion! I like to help people who are truly in need. My go-to cause is contributing a bit to helping kids get cancer treatment :).
I have a 25 before 25 list XD.