Before the Year Disappears, What Do You Still Want to Experience?

October has a funny way of arriving.

One minute it feels like the year is still stretching out ahead of us. We’re looking forward to summer, the slower rhythm, permission to read, relax, chill for a moment.

Then, literally in the blink of an eye, Halloween costumes are sitting right next to the sunscreen.

Kinda rude! I mean, really, can’t we even exhale?

Now October is here, three quarters of the year are suddenly behind us, and here come Thanksgiving, Christmas, holiday plans, and someone somewhere reminding us how many days we have left to accomplish everything we said we would do in January.

We all know the spiel.

Finish the project. Lose the weight. Organize the house. Make the plan. Hit the goal.

There is nothing wrong with goals. I like accomplishing things too.

But lately I’ve been wondering whether we are asking ourselves the wrong question.

Instead of:

What do I still need to get done this year?

What if we asked:

What do I still want to experience?

There’s a difference.

Getting something done means one more thing off the never-ending checklist. There’s satisfaction in the moment.

But five minutes later?

Meh.

When life becomes something we manage

We take care of the appointments. Answer the messages. Handle what needs handling. Show up for the people who depend on us. Keep the wheels turning.

And from the outside, everything may look perfectly fine.

We can become so focused on keeping everything going that we forget to ask what makes us want to be here for it.

Sometimes what’s missing isn’t some enormous life change.

It’s smaller.

• Anticipation.
• Curiosity.
• Novelty.
• Beauty.
• A conversation that goes somewhere unexpected.
• A place we’ve never seen.
• The feeling of laughing so hard we forget what we were worried about.

These moments can seem almost frivolous next to the serious business of keeping everything, and everyone, going.

But maybe they aren’t frivolous at all.

They are part of what keeps life from becoming one long list of things to handle.

What are you looking forward to?

Here’s a question I’ve started paying more attention to:

What am I looking forward to?

Not what am I working toward.

Not what I “should” be doing.

What am I genuinely looking forward to?

There have been seasons when the answer came easily. Trips. New projects. A relaxed meal with someone I love. An idea I couldn’t wait to explore.

And there have been other stretches when I realized that almost everything on my calendar was something I needed to attend to.

Not because it lit me up.

Because it was on my list.

Have you ever noticed how a life filled mostly with obligations can make time seem to shrink?

Yet having something you genuinely look forward to can do the opposite. Suddenly there’s a little more breathing room. A sense of possibility. Something pulling you toward tomorrow.

And what you look forward to doesn’t have to be impressive.

In fact, the best things may be quite small. Some we plan. Others find us when we leave enough room for serendipity.

• Swimming at sunset.
• Trying the little restaurant you keep driving past.
• Taking a pottery class.
• Calling someone you miss.
• Actually reading the novel sitting beside your bed.
• Learning Italian.
• Exploring somewhere alone, meandering at the pace of wonder.
• Planting something and seeing if it grows.
• Dancing in your kitchen.
• Doing something just because you enjoy it.

The point isn’t to manufacture excitement.

It’s to notice what sparks something in you.

There are still three months left

We have a choice.

We can fall into the familiar year-end sprint.

Or we can remember that December 31 is a date on the calendar, not a verdict on how well we have lived the year.

There are still three months of actual life ahead of us.

Three months to notice beauty that has been there all along.

• To create a few small adventures.
• To call the friend we keep meaning to call.
• To become better at noticing joy in unexpected places.
• To follow an idea simply because it interests us.
• To pay attention when something inside says, go there.
• To say yes to an invitation.
• Or make one ourselves.

We often think feeling more alive requires a dramatic reinvention.

I’m not convinced it has to be that way.

Sometimes it begins by interrupting the familiar.

Taking a different route.

Talking to someone you wouldn’t normally talk to.

Signing up for something before you have time to overthink it.

Looking more closely at something you pass every day.

Allowing yourself to wonder, What would be fun?

• Not useful.
• Not productive.
• Not impressive.
• F-u-n.

For some reason, adults can get very serious about living well.

Maybe part of living well is remembering how to play with life a little.

A different kind of list

So before you make another list of everything that needs to be completed before December 31, try making another kind.

Ask yourself:

What do I want to experience before this year is over?

Maybe there are five things.

Maybe there is only one.

And try not to turn this into another performance review of your life. This isn’t about squeezing every possible drop out of the next ninety days.

Leave some room for surprise. For the moments you couldn’t possibly have scheduled.

Watch a meteor shower.

Learn to make one fantastic meal.

Spend a day somewhere beautiful without taking out your phone.

Tell someone something you have been meaning to say.

Wear the beautiful thing you keep saving.

Take yourself somewhere new.

Try something you’re not particularly good at and laugh at being a beginner.

Follow a curiosity for no reason other than the fact that it’s yours.

Because someday, this particular October will be part of your past.

And perhaps the question won’t only be:

What did I accomplish while I was here?

Maybe there’s another one worth asking:

Was I here for the moments?

Was I open to something that caught my attention?

Something I hadn’t discovered yet?

Someone I wanted to know more deeply?

Something beautiful, funny, surprising, delicious, or completely unnecessary?

Something that reminded me, quietly but unmistakably:

I am here. And I am alive.