Life…
It’s my birthday today! Thank you for all the kind and thoughtful birthday wishes. On this birthday, my 39th, I wanted to take a step back and offer you the following…
So far in my life, I have lived 7 years in Sri Lanka, 16 years in Canada and 16 years in the US. Without getting too mathematical, if I attribute 1/3 of the impact on my life to each place wrt to my health and long term outlook, my life expectancy is 75.6 years. It seems that I’m relatively healthy so barring the unexpected, and with some focus on exercise (mind and body), diet and happiness, maybe I will push that into the 80s. But assuming its 75.6, that means I have 36.6 years or, more importantly, 13,383 days. Holy shit! 13,383 days!?!?!? 36.6 years seems like a decently long time but 13,383 days seems like a sprint around the block.
I think most people do some form of this math as they get older, as their kids get older and as loved ones around them pass away. The question is what do you do with this? I have been pondering this really intensely for several months now as a means to figure out the most basic things like what does and doesn’t matter in my life.
So, here are my goals in these next 13,383 days:
1) Family — I want to be around them, love them, support them, hug and kiss them.
2) Friends — I want to support them, embellish them, promote them, confide in them, count on them.
3) Memories — I want to think back on events and have an emotional reaction. Capital is a lubricant to my and other’s ideas no matter how big, small, indulgent or sacrificial as long as I’ll have some awesome reaction after it’s done.
4) Legacy — I must do something that lasts well after these next 13,383 days.
So at the end of every week now, I’m asking myself the following:
1) How many days did I do the things above?
2) How many days did I just give into the norm vs push back? Fight back…
3) How many days was I happy? Like, really happy. Not fake, cosmetic happy.
4) How many days did I give up what I really wanted because someone else’s marginal validation tricked me from focusing on the bigger picture?
This post is self-indulgent in that it’s about what I want. The part that is probably meaningful to you is asking yourself what you want.
I have no idea when my day_count = 0 but it really doesn’t matter. My most basic takeaway is that there is a finite number of days left to be my true self and live up to my expectations of myself.
Said more succinctly, for me, its time to really start fucking some shit up…
