Viva a List?

In April 2008, while working an event in California for work, I met Heather. Friendly and easy-going, Heather and I hit it off right away, chatting non-stop about the pros and cons of our event planning jobs, what we would be doing if we weren't in the communications field, and what we hoped to accomplish in our futures. In the quick weekend I spent working with Heather, she taught me some important lessons: to take chances, that there's no one right answer, to work hard but never let your "job" come before your life and, most importantly, that there's so much out there to see and do - best get started while you're young!


While we worked and chatted, Heather shared with me that she had been keeping a blog to keep in touch with family and friends in her home state of Utah while she worked and lived in New York City with her husband. Within the blog she had posted a "to-do" list - a bucket list of sorts, citing goals that she would like to accomplish in the next 10 years. You often hear people talk about the things they want to do "before they die"; things that they would like to accomplish in their lifetime. This list was Heather's way of keeping track and she decided to share it with her family and friends as a way of helping to keep herself on track with her goals. It's clear that Heather had a tenacity about her - on her list, not only had she doodled down ideas of some hobbies she'd like to take on, but had set admirable goals that would affect the world on a large scale...and, by the time I got to see the list, had already accomplished quite a few.


As a fresh-out-of-college, twenty-three year-old woman, I was and am no stranger to soul-searching, daily weighing the pros and cons of what I could do with my life, what's important to me, and how I should spend my time so that I simultaneously make a difference in the world and myself happy. Heather's energetic explanation of her list of goals was enough motivation for me. I began writing mine in the airport while waiting for my red-eye flight to arrive to take me from California to visit my parents in Florida. I realized that by taking myself out of my every-day "grind", my mind was more open to possibilities that I had not ever considered. My list ranged from simple goals that I knew I could accomplish by signing up for a class at a local community center, to traveling to remote/random countries, to things that could only be accomplished with fate's cooperation. So was born my list: 33 before 33. 10 years to accomplish what I consider at 23 to be worth doing, experiencing, seeing, and learning.


More recently, I realized that, perhaps, it might not even be about what I want out of life but rather what life wants out of me. To float along with life is surely better than fighting against the current. What we think should happen and what life has planned for us are often very different. Regardless, I don't believe that it hurts to challenge yourself, to challenge life to deal you cards that you think may be worthwhile to play. If nothing else, it's been said that setting goals for yourself keeps your motivated, on your toes opposed to on the couch. And after 33? Well...first things first.


I was originally going to keep my list private, tucked neatly in the notebook in which I wrote it. But the more thought I gave it, I realized that I wanted to share my list like the way I share my life with my friends and family. Giving it more thought, I knew just the people who I could not only share my list with, but who could be a part of the list, who could also challenge themselves to 33 before 33.


One year post-graduation, I can still see a large part of myself in my friends from college. A group of us have remained close, charged by memories of our dirty college houses, endless parties, heartaches, and sorority days. During the past year they have been my support and source of laughter, mirroring my concerns and frustrations regarding jobs, boys and life. Almost daily e-mails are written between us as we sit at our brand new shiny cubicles, offices, or desks where we study. We are psychology students, nurses, public relations coordinators, fundraisers and event planners. We work in the city, the suburbs, and on campus. We're single, we're dating, we're living with our boyfriend. We laugh, we cry, we complain. We're happy, we're sad, we're in-between. Individually, we talk to each other once an hour, once a day, once a week or once a month. We're typical American twenty-something women searching for happiness and love in a world that seems to be growing less typical and more scary every day. But we have each other.


And I can can think of no one better than to share our lists, and our lives, with than each other.


Enjoy!
Julie