I Don't Have a Bucket List

I just realized recently that I DON'T HAVE A BUCKET LIST.  Should I? Am I the only one who doesn't?

Last year I had a goal of doing the Princess Margaret Walk for Women's Cancers in honour of my friend J, who was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.  I did it and me and my team raised over $7,000!  I am proud of that and glad I did it as a way to end my last year before turning 40.

But now what?  Do I need to be making a list of things I feel I must do in my lifetime?  Is this something we should all do so we don't squander away the precious time we have on this earth before we leave it?  After all, research shows that people who take risks are happier and lead more fulfilled lives.  Truthfully, I have never been a risk taker, although others tell me a mid-life career transition was pretty risky!

I do want to go to Israel, but honestly even with that, I don't feel like it will be a tragedy if it doesn't happen.  I love exploring cities and, theoretically, I would love to visit places like Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Bangkok in Asia, and Prague, Rome and Athens in Europe.  Australia would be cool, as would some cities in South America.  Remote/rural places don't interest me that much.  The problem is my hatred of flying, my motion sickness and my huge aversion of extreme heat, bugs, etc.  A lot of tropical places, even in the most urban of environments might be too much for me.  Right now I am reading the autobiography of Amanda Lindhout and her accounts of travelling to various places and the challenges and discomforts she faced make me never want to do any high-risk travel! And I'm not even talking about her famous kidnapping, but just the backpacking she did before she got into being a journalist.

Skydiving maybe?  Well now that you can simulate the experience, I think I'd rather do that, and have actually been thinking about it.  But if I never do it, I won't be broken up.

Do I want to run a marathon, a 1/2 even?  Nope.  An Ironman? Nope.

I briefly thought of doing one of those 'figure' competitions...actually my sister-in-law was telling me I should.  While I pretty much train like one of those women already, there is no way I could follow the necessary restrictive diets.  I'd lose my mind!  Also, those competitions aren't really about fitness at all, just appearance, and I want nothing to do with that, its actually disgusting to me.

Really, all I want to do is continue to grow my counselling practice, my business, stay as healthy and fit as possible for life, and raise two healthy, happy children.  I also want to, hopefully, retire comfortably with my wonderful husband and have grandchildren.  That's it! 

Is that enough? I don't know.  Maybe I need to set some more goals.  Publish a book?  Write an article for the New York Times? Be on television?  Bench press 150 lbs? Create a fitness DVD?  Teach a course? These are more like life goals than bucket list items though.

For now, I am going to set the goal of spending the summer figuring out my goals and whether there really are some other things I need (or want) to start working towards. Yep, my goal is to figure out my goals, ha!

This weekend isn't going to be much of one. I am going into the clinic to see clients both Saturday and Sunday, but at least I love my work, and I'll have the afternoons with the family and hopefully the weather will cooperate.  Have a healthy, happy and safe one!