What is best in life?
You’ve probably heard the question before, maybe the first thing that sprung to mind was the answer Conan gave and there’s certainly merit to it. But hardly practical for your own life and the modern world. It’s a tough question the more you think about it. What, in fact, is best in life? Is it making gobs of money hand over fist? Surely that’s a nice thing but probably not what’s best in life. Whatever dating the sexiest women or driving the fastest car? Again, nothing wrong with either but probably not the best things in life.
So what is it then? Well truth be told I don’t think there’s any one best thing in life, rather the best things in life are going to be different at different times and be a culmination of things, not just one single thing. And what is best in life is going to be different for different people and is going to change depending on what stage of life that you’re in. But with that being said I think there are some things that we can all agree on, some things that we can all say have a part in the best life. Things like freedom, ability to express yourself physically, mentally, spiritually, and the like.
For example, for me at this stage of my life the though of living in some expensive apartment in a large city sounds horrible, it just does, for many different reasons. However not too long ago that is exactly what I was doing and enjoying it. But as I’ve said things change and not all that glitters is gold. But enough of that for now. Before we look at building/creating your ideal life, it’s important to think about what that actually is. I’d recommend writing it down, just freewrite if you can’t think of anything. Write down whatever comes to mind for 5-10 minutes straight, just keep writing, then go over it after. You’ll find some gems.
The Importance Of Dreaming Up Your Ideal Life
We’ve talked before about why the “why” is the most important question that you can ask, but with that being said it’s not the only question. You also need to figure out the “what” and then the “how”. Here we’ll be discussing the “what” portion. What does your ideal life look like? What does it include, what doesn’t it include. Maybe it’s a big city filled with different people and different things to do, maybe it’s traveling around the world experiencing a different culture every other week, or maybe it’s finding a nice quiet part of this world with a good solid community. I’m not here to judge just to prompt thought about what works for you.
No one thing is better than the other if it’s inherently what you actually want. One person’s heaven is another’s hell and so on and so forth. Think about what fits with your goals, aspirations, cultural leanings, ideology, and personality. Try to take “test runs” whenever you can, get a taste of the life that you’re going after. To make sure that it’s really for you before going all in. Just like when moving, it’s one thing to vacation to an area it’s a whole other thing to live there. This works the other way too, some places to vacation are boring as hell yet also great places to live. Do a dry run before going all in on the real thing.
It might be renting a place in the city for a month, it might be traveling around Europe/the country/wherever for a month, it might be living in the boonies and all that comes with it for a short period of time. Look for opportunities to dry run what you think your ideal life would be and how closely it matches up with the life that you’re actually living. Sometimes the idea is better then the reality, and sometimes not. It’s important to figure this out before going all in on anything. And then there’s always unexpected things many forget to factor in. The crime in the city, the lack of community and roots being a world traveler, the isolation of living in a very rural area, and so on and so forth. Nowhere is perfect.
Working Towards A Moving Goal
And here’s the other thing, no matter how much thought you put into it, it’ll change, that’s the nature of life. Especially if you’re growing, learning, and improving each and every day. So understand that your goal and ideal life will change but you can still set up some fundamental things that are going to help you no matter what. For example getting your money right and becoming financially independent as possible. Getting stuck in one place can be dangerous anymore, it pays to be able to move when needed. And I mean this in more ways than one.
I still think copywriting offers to best bet if you don’t know anything else. Sales is another skill that’ll never go out of style and will always help you make money. I’m less a fan of blogging and information product type sites then I was before but they can still work then done right, though copywriting and sales would still be my go to. Another is politically/demographic/cultural differences in places. I think, unfortunately, that this is something that is going to become a bigger and bigger deal in the future. Humans are by nature tribal and so corporation, bank, or government is going to be able to change this.
I know many Westerns have never lived in a place divided by things like religion/race/ideology/culture and the like and are naive to how bad it can be. When things get hot you don’t want to be the “other” in the area that you’re in, that’s for sure. So something else to consider and get right. But those would be the two most important things that I can think of. Getting your money right and “demographics” or whatever you want to call it. Don’t be naive to these things.
One Foot In Front Of The Other
No matter what this is something that’ll take years to get anywhere close to. I’d set out five years before hoping to even crack the surface of your ideal life, if you’re starting from scratch. Say a kid just finishing college or moving out of your parents or whatever. If you’re a bit older and more established then it’ll still take years, and I’d still set aside at least five before hoping to be anywhere close, but you’ll be closer. Things to think about now and get working on right away. There’s a lot of work to be done.
But if you put one foot in front of the other, FOR YEARS ON END, while also learning and refining, then you’ll make it so long as you don’t give up.
