If You’re 30 Years Old, You Have About 2,400 Saturdays Left

Stoics view death not as a sad impending doom, but as a navigation tool to help you reposition what’s important in your life.

Mortality is seen as a constant reminder to cherish the time you have left on Earth and to make life meaningful for you. According to the Stoics, if you view mortality any other way, you are missing the point of the lesson death has to offer you.

If you’re 30 years old, you have about 2,400 Saturdays left in your life.

You can shave and add on a couple of Saturdays depending on how close or far you are from 30.

When you’re given the lens of viewing mortality through the measure of your Saturdays, it really puts a fire in your bones to make each day count.

Here are the two things I plan on integrating to make the 2,000+ Saturdays I have left meaningful to me.

The Kaizen Principle

Rather than setting big goals this year, I’m going to focus on the mini-goal of making each day meaningful.

I want to improve by 1% every day rather than focus on a quantum leap where the jump requires all or nothing.

This principle of continuous improvement through small daily actions is called kaizen. Kaizen originates from Japan and means change (kai) for the good (zen).

Kaizen is guided by the belief that anything can be improved through small changes because they compound to substantial changes over the long term. This kind of change is easier to implement, more adaptable, and much smoother of a transition. There’s no radical innovation that’s needed and you don’t experience intense transitional pains.

Journaling

When I’m in the midst of going after a big goal, I get in the bad habit of working so rigorously that all my days blend together. I don’t look up outside of my work. I don’t remember what I did on Monday vs. what I did Thursday because I didn’t make those days count beyond the checklist I had to fulfill for that bigger goal I’m chasing.

Do you ever experience this? Where you’re sprinting on a big project and the days get so long and redundant that they all feel like the same day?

Your days during this time may feel significant as a group, but individually, they’re not the most joyful days you’ve had.

Stoics use journaling as a tool to provide clarity and to reflect on how they’re going to spend their time before the day breaks.

Journaling is used as a venue where you can reflect on the day you just lived and the day you’re about to live. You reflect on what should be added or removed based on how your day went and use it to craft the next day meaningfully.

It’s kind of like filling out a daily scorecard and seeing what you can do better for next time.

I love the idea of using journaling as a tool to meticulously reflect on my day so that I can fine-tune the next day to be better.

Having an agenda for the upcoming day feels like a solid approach to making the day feel intentional and meaningful even if it stands by itself.

And this is the point after all — Stoics believed that you should live each day with intense intention so that if your time was up tomorrow, that your last day would feel well-lived.