Jumpstart the Creation of Your Ideal Life: Make a List of 100 Things to Do Before You Die

Getting around to thinking about what your ideal life would look like and committing that vision to paper is difficult, if not impossible, to do when you’re pretty much in a rut. Every day starts to look a lot like the one before and you’re so bogged down in the minutiae of the day-to-day that you just can’t even phantom an ideal life, much less find the energy to go about creating it. In order to be able to think in terms of the life of your dreams—as you used to do once upon a time--you need to be reawakened, and the way to get a jumpstart on the creation of your ideal life is to make a list of 100 things to do before you die.

You’re going to create your list by having an individual brainstorming session. Set your kitchen timer to go off in forty-five minutes and find a place where you won’t be interrupted. Play Baroque music in the background, if you have it. Baroque music, such as “The Four Seasons” by Antonio Vivaldi and Pachbel’s “Cannon” have been shown to slow brainwaves down to the Alpha range, the brain frequency which has been linked to increased creativity.

Do not criticize or evaluate what you write down during the brainstorming process: you’re trying to open yourself up to possibilities. Write down whatever comes into your head, it doesn’t matter how wildly impractical the idea seems. Basically, you’re going to have to quiet your internal critic, that little voice in your head that might be saying: “You can’t do that”; “That’s silly”; “I can’t afford that.” Push the limits on what you currently think is possible for you and think outside the boundaries of your current life.

Don’t stop at 100; write down as many things as come to your mind. Later you can sift through the list you created and narrow it down to 100.

The list can consist of books you want to read, places you want to visit, people you want to meet, adventures you want to have, skills you want to master, and so on. It can include things such as the following:

• Write a book, and get it published;

• Spend New Year’s Eve in Times Square, New York;

• Visit the Great Wall of China;

• Learn to tango, in Buenos Aires, Argentina;

• Swim with dolphins;

• Run a marathon, or at least a 10K;

• Learn to play the piano;

• Fly in a hot air balloon;

• Go parachuting;

• Go whale-watching;

• Be an extra in a film;

• Meet your favorite celebrity;

• Find and marry the love of your life;

• Learn to juggle;

• Scuba dive off Australia's Great Barrier Reef;

• Appear on the cover of “Time” magazine;

• See the Mona Lisa in person at the Louvre Museum in Paris.

Your list should spark excitement, rekindle your zest for life, and encourage you to look at your life like a daring adventure. However, the purpose of this exercise isn’t just creating a list; it’s about setting out to accomplish the things on your list. So, once you have your list choose the first item you’re going to check off and get to it. Sail out to sea. . . nn