Picture yourself on vacation in a destination you have always desired to visit. It's the afternoon of your final day there, and the sun is not quite setting, but it has passed its peak point in the sky and it is slowly starting to retreat towards the horizon. In a few hours, it will be gone. Soon it will be the darkness of night, and everything will start to slow and as you get ready to call it a day, but for now, you have a few more hours of sunlight to fully enjoy your time here.
Now ask yourself, what would you do? How are you feeling? What are your thoughts?
Enjoy it. Take it in. A sense of appreciation, happiness, a touch of sadness that it's coming to an end. Most people can vividly create a picture of these moments, or can remember a time when something similar has occurred to them. You remember it, because you looked forward to being there, you enjoyed it, and you knew when it was coming to an end.
Now imagine that vacation is your life.
Imagine you knew when it was going to end. You knew when it was all over, and maybe it wasn't as far away as you thought. What would you do differently?
Living in a tropical vacation climate, I see people daily who "live" normal, routine based lives back at home, that get away on vacation and become re-invigorated like an electric jolt brought them back to life. They pack their days with tours, day trips, hikes, historic expeditions, and jungle treks. They visit shows and performances, relax at the beach, the pool, visit bars, meet other outgoing people. They take photos, videos, buy things for each other, laugh, hug and kiss and just enjoy themselves without any inhibitions.
Why? Urgency. They have been here before, they know it is short, they know when it ends, they know when their flight home is and that they will be back home in the routine, vacation over, with those first few melancholy days back at work before refocusing and getting back to the grind.
So why don't people enjoy life like this? Why don't people have the same appreciation? Many will answer, well its because its vacation vs. normal life, and yes, I understand that, but it comes down to urgency. When you know when something is going to end, within yourself you create a sense of urgency, or a sense of understanding of the situation and that it will all be over. The difference between vacation and life is that, for most of us, we have no idea when the real "end" is.
Countless amount of people waste time, days, weeks, months, years to do things or find the appreciation in the small stuff because of the "there's always tomorrow" mentality. Are you sure? Is there tomorrow? I was speaking with a lady the other day, 76 years old from Maryland, and we were talking about travel, and I mentioned that I am working towards creating a life where I can tick something off my bucket list, and adding something to it, as often as I can. Her response "Aren't you too young to have a bucket list?"
I responded, "With all due respect ma'am, do you know when my time is up?" With life expectancy increasing, people naturally have this sense that they will reach those twilight years, with a nice old reclining chair to watch their grandkids grow up... they think they have time. The bottom line, you have no idea.
It takes significant moments in people's lives to open their eyes to this fact. Turning points like tragedies, losing a loved one, near death experiences, overcoming an illness, can often do it, but unfortunately, some people never see the reality before it's too late. If you haven't had yours yet, let this be your turning point.
Stop procrastinating, stop being negative, stop being pessimistic. Start doing, start enjoying, and start living with urgency.
Check out Will's YouTube Channel : No Regrets Lifestyle