The Bucket List

“Why am I doing this?”

That seems to be a popular question for me… why I would do something like the “Year of Living Frugally”.

I have a job. A job with a pension and health insurance. I can currently afford my bills – outstanding debt included. There are people in this rural community who would kill for the job security I currently have.

So… why?

I spend most of my time working. I do not hate my job, but I also do not love it. I can cover my debt, but I’m not getting ahead. The weeks and months are starting to fly by, and all I’m doing is accruing time for my pension. I’m restless.

It has to do with my “bucket list”.

(Okay, I stole the title from a movie I have not seen, but the concept is a common one.)

Do you have a list of things you want to do before you die (kick the bucket)?

Is it a good idea to have a bucket list?

Bucket lists lead to midlife crisis.

According to the literature, the midlife crisis is about a “desire to achieve a feeling of youthfulness”. A middle-aged male in the throes of a midlife crisis is supposed to buy a sports car, chase after young women, and conspicuously consume.

What a crock. Leave it to western medicine to treat the symptoms and not the source of the angst.

The forty-hour-per-week job usually does very little for people looking to fulfill their goals – unless their goals are to have work become the primary focus of their existence. The bucket list is only a reminder of all the dreams and aspirations that slowly move farther away while you’re putting in overtime trying to meet that next deadline.

Human beings did not evolve to spend 60 hours a week working in front of a computer. It is an unnatural act. We still have very strong instincts driving us – and we spend 50 weeks per year suppressing these instincts so we can make money to buy more useless crap to distract us from what we’re really missing. The only instincts we can regularly satisfy during the workweek are the ones dealing with eating, sleeping and sex. Do you ever wonder why – that in a country where the 2-week-per-year vacation is normal – we have epidemic levels of obesity, depression and porn?

Also interesting is the fact that Japan and India show very few instances of midlife crisis. The authors write this off on cultural differences – that the “culture of youth” is not as prevalent in those societies. I would argue that Eastern philosophy teaches one to give up desires – that desire only leads to suffering (so they are less likely to have unfulfilled bucket lists in the first place?).

So, without further ado, here is my “midlife crisis list” (otherwise known as my bucket list).

• Become fluent in spanish
• Learn to play guitar
• Travel around the world
• Live at least one year working in another country
• Surf a legitimate 3-second tube ride (3 seconds is eternity in the tube)
• Build a house (that I live in)
• Have a kidlet or two and teach them to surf
• Surf when I’m 80 (and all the years in between)

I may not get to all of them – each one of those take a dedicated time commitment.

I do need to begin working towards some of those – or my “midlife crisis” will get worse.