Writing a Bucketlist has become a pretty common thing to do. People are out there living their dreams because of their lists. The difference between the people living their bucketlists and those who simply write them and go back to their humdrum daily lives is they know that writing the list is only the first step, not the most important. The most important step to living your dreams is what you do after you write it.

Planning it:

Don’t think that your excitement alone will be enough. We are all excited about the idea of having six pack abs until we see those cookies at work three days later and eat 7 of them.

The “cookies at work” in your life is likely the money that you will spend on a new pair of shoes or going out to dinner and having drinks. The excitement of your dream fades when you see the beautiful new shoes in front of you.  One thing I can guarantee is that if you say “no” to the shoes and drinks, you will spend zero seconds of your life in a hammock on the beach or piloting an airplane wishing you had bought the shoes. I cannot say the same for the opposite however.

How will you actually accomplish some of these items like “fly an airplane?” Flying seems cool. Without a plan though, unless you have an rich uncle with a plane and the crazy urge to let you fly it, you’ll very likely NEVER DO IT.

However. If you google search “Learn to fly an airplane (with your city or state)” you can easily find out exactly where and when you can learn and how much it will cost to be piloting an airplane after only minor instruction! I actually found a Groupon for learning to fly for only $60 and I took off and landed the plane on the first day.

Taking action:

You will accomplish nothing without action. The time you spent writing out your dreams will now be only useful to you when you dredge up all of your regrets and things you never did.

Start small. Pick the “easiest” three items, or the ones that excite you the most and commit to accomplishing them within the next 1-3 months.

You can write “Go to Thailand”, but without understanding exactly how much money you will need, what time of year you want to go and make the decision of going alone or with friends, it’s as effective as wishing you could go to Thailand on your birthday candles or crossing your fingers and hoping you somehow win a trip there on the price is right.

The easy part is putting it on paper. The most important part is planning it and the fun part is living it!

If you really want to live your dream life,

WRITE IT, PLAN IT, LIVE IT

Chase Boehringer