The Life List Begins

I’m currently flying from Chicago to Los Angeles. It’s a long flight, and it will be accompanied by a long drive. But it’s giving me some much needed introspection time. I need it because I’m having to contemplate my whole life.

I’m about to attend Camp Mighty, the awesome brainchild of Maggie Mason and crew. I’ve been looking forward to it not only because of the warm California weather (it was snowing yesterday in Chicago – WTF?), not only because I’ll get to mix and mingle with some really smart and fun people, not only because it’s at the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs – I’ve been looking forward to it because of a particular exercise “campers” go through: making a Life List.

In practical terms, a Life List is similar to a bucket list, only less morbid. In it, you outline things you want to accomplish in life, but there are particular parameters around Life Lists that make them special. Parameters like it can’t contain any guilt-driven things (“Lose 10 pounds.”) It has to be fun.

And the list shouldn’t be set in stone – it’s a living, breathing constitution for your life goals. If in a few years things change, and one doesn’t seem right anymore, strike it with no guilt.

Of course I have seen others make such a list, and was familiar with the concept. But I had never gone through the exercise myself. Here and now, on a plane flying somewhere over Nevada for all I know, I’m doing it. I’m writing down everything I’ve ever wanted to do in life. It’s simultaneously scary and exhilarating.

So far, I’ve put down a little over 50 items on my list (the goal is 100). Here’s what I’m working with so far, in no particular order. And I ask you to withhold your judgements about both how lofty and how simple some of them are:

• Fight in a boxing match
• Learn to play the banjo
• Bungee jump
• Visit the Great Wall
• Scuba dive in the Great Barrier Reef
• Drive a convertible down Route 66
• Restore an old muscle car
• Write a memoir
• Write a novel
• Hike down the Grand Canyon (and back up)
• Invent something
• Run a 5K
• Run a marathon
• Be invited to the White House
• Pilot a plane
• Own my own art studio
• Do a studio photography shoot
• Design my own menswear line
• Walk the Camino de Santiago
• Have a working ranch (with horses)
• Become a CEO
• Pick grapes in Tuscany
• Go on an African safari
• Go on a silent retreat
• Speak at a TED conference
• Meet Nelson Mandela
• Meet Desmond Tutu
• Drive a professional racecar on a track
• Hunt for my food
• Go parasailing
• Paint a beautiful painting
• Learn to sail
• Build Caroline a rocking chair
• Play a sold out stadium
• Release an album
• Own a coffeehouse
• Be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
• See Mount Rushmore
• Attend a Hollywood movie premier
• Act in a movie
• See the Pyramids
• See Stone Hinge
• See Easter Island
• Bet on a winning horse
• Hold political office
• Sail around the Tierra del Fuego
• Teach a college class
• Learn to cook
• Write for the New Yorker
• Be on the Moth podcast
• Tell a story for This American Life
• Learn to whittle
• Start a million dollar company

One thing this exercise has done that I wasn’t expecting was to help me realize how much I didn’t have to put on the list. I’ve already skydived. I’ve seen the Colosseum and the Acropolis. I’ve seen several Broadway shows in New York. In short, I think I’ve done a damn good job with my non-written Life List so far. Now thanks to Camp Mighty, I can just make the rest “official.”

And you know what, who says I can’t do this stuff? The more I wrote down, the more ridiculous it felt. But at the same time, I thought, Why not? Why can’t this kid from a semi-small Oklahoma town accomplish most if not all of this stuff? I’m not expecting to do it all, but I’d rather lean towards Yes, I will do this rather than I could never do that.

What would be on your list? I bet you could think of five things off the top of your head, just like I did. The things that always linger towards the surface, gnawing at you. What’s something scary that you haven’t wanted to voice?

(PS, The image above is of my newly acquired Field Notes from their Tatt.ly collaboration. Pretty awesome stuff.)

Tagged as: Camp Mighty, Life List