Blogging is already slightly ‘out of fashion’.
Most people have moved on to videos. In the last 10 years, Vine came and went. YouTube is still kind of around. TikTok seems to be the thing of the moment now.
So, I don’t know if this blog will still exist. I hope it does! I hope as long as wordpress keeps existing, I keep writing. And if wordpress doesn’t exist, I hope I’m able to move this blog to a different website. So, okay, let’s assume that somehow in whatever crazy future we’re living in with holograms and chips implanted in our hands and stuff, that somehow, someway this blog is still existing, and I’m still writing in it –
Well, I would actually, from my first blog post, still like to run a marathon in every state. So, I’d love to be at least halfway done with this. So, if right now I’m at 7 states, I’d like to get 18 more, so I can be at 25 states.
I’d also in general like to do a marathon on every continent, so it’d be nice if I could be halfway (or over halfway) done with that. So, maybe marathons on 3 more continents (since I obviously already have North America).
I want to visit every country in the world. I don’t know that I need to be halfway done, per se – though I would love to be! But even if I can be somewhere in the vicinity of 60 or so countries (total, not just in the next 10 years, but including ones I’ve already been to), I would call that a huge win, as international travel can be somewhat hard to make happen.
I’d loooooove to be at least two awards into an EGOT. Sadly, a fair amount of that is out of my control. But some of it also is! So, I can try my best, and cross my fingers. I really do want that EGOT – although as I get older I realize both how much harder it is than I thought, and seeing peers win a number of those, I see how winning awards never actually fulfills people in any meaningful way. But still. I think I would love it nonetheless.
On a personal note, I’d like to be a lot better at being a thermostat, not a thermometer [a great things Cory Booker always says], and setting the tone in my life rather than letting other people set it, or responding so hard to what they do – and I mean this micro and macro, to be good and emotionally regulated in close relationships, and also in small things or with people I don’t know at all – e.g. to not to so exasperatedly exclaim “representative!!” when I’m in an annoying robot menu of some business.
I’d like to feel more deeply connected to people, and I’d like to have more connections in general. Pre-pandemic, one of my friends always joked about how I knew everyone, and if he needed access to an astronaut, he’d come to me, because he’d know I would know someone who could get him an astronaut.
I think I’ve let a lot of people fall away during the pandemic, but I like being that ultra-connected person. So, I’d like to be that connected, but also having deeper connections with people, and really try to prioritize that instead of just clearly measurable goals (such as number of countries and marathons and that type of thing).
I’d love to be on at least 5 more game shows. Technically, you can be on one a year, and I’d like to try to be on a bunch (with the idea being that just due to tape schedules and stuff, you’ll probably never be in a perfect rotation of as soon as a year passes, immediately getting on your next one). But 5 is assuming every other year. So, while I know you don’t always get cast in every game show, I’m gonna do my best.
I really want to be on a dance team for a professional sports team – preferably in the NBA, but practically any sport will do. I have always wanted to do this. And if I don’t do it in the next 10 years, it is extraordinarily unlikely I ever will. (I mean, there have been cheerleaders in their 40s, but they are VERY rare. And I guess you could be in that group for seniors that dances for the New York Liberty, but that’s not really what I’m after.) So, in the next 10 years, I’d LOVE to be on a professional dance team for some team, somewhere. Even just a season would scratch the itch of that urge.
I want to finally give my freaking kidney to a stranger! How long has it been that I’ve been trying to do that?! Geeeeeez haha. So, if I get 10 more years, that BETTER happen.
I’d love to raise $35,000 more dollars for charity/political causes I believe in, in the next 10 years. I’ve done a little over $15,000 through various charity stuff so far, and it’d be nice to get up to $50,000 that I’d done in my lifetime. (It’d be great if it could even be more.)
I want to learn to ride a bike already haha. That’s something I talk about doing all the time. And then I want to use it to enjoy more athletic events – century bike rides, triathlons, just some cool stuff!
I’d like to have another advanced degree (besides my MA, which I’ve already done). And I won’t pick now, because I think a lot of them could be super interesting, but whatever one I get (if I do get one), I want it to be something I’m SUPER passionate to learn about. I don’t want to do it for another bullet point on a resume, but I want to get things out of it, truly – to expand my brain.
I’d like to do at least 5 more “52 in 52 projects,” outside of the one I’m currently doing. And I’d love if at least 3 of them felt truly worthwhile. The ones I’ve done thus far have kind of run the gamut. And the one I’m currently doing (52 yoga poses) is basically just to remember to stretch, and something that was doable in the pandemic without breaking my streak. So, I’d love for them to be things that that feel worthwhile, and not just “time for a project.”
I guess all that to say, I think I want to try to like overall live a little more meaningfully in the next 10 years. While a lot of the “stuff” might be the same I want to live more to do the things I want – not just the things that will look good, but the things I really want. And I want to try to really enjoy them instead of always wondering what’s next, and looking to the next thing…
It’s good, of course to always want more, to want to do more, achieve more, grow more. But my ability to truly enjoy the present moment has waned back and forth throughout the years. And I hope I’m fairly successfully at that over these next 10 years.
If you have anything you think I missed, any other ideas, etc, please let me know in the comments. And I check on this in 2032, and see how things worked out!