“This feels like an AA meeting with a glass of wine.”
This got everyone laughing at one of our improv gatherings, but how we got to it wasn’t exactly funny. After hustling through the wacky warm ups (which you can’t help giggle or at least grin through), we were instructed to meditate into quiet moment and reflect back on our lives at age 25:
- What kind of work were you doing?
- What was your hairstyle?
- Who were you hanging out with?
- What music you were listing to?
We provided our answers in the present tense, essentially helping us temporarily become our 25-year-old selves again.
What emerged from this structured journey backward was a collection of stories of people who felt they had either been living their lives for someone else, living for the moment, or living life as planned but without meaning and satisfaction. This introspection forced us to look at the lives we are now actively living, and the ones we feel we should have had or might yet have.
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We came face to face with our unlived lives. It was a sobering moment, despite the glasses of wine in our hands. Then, someone in the group recalled a TEDx talk called Rethinking the Bucket List. It’s an inspiring 10-minute talk about how we should all consider the purpose of our lives at any age. I recommend giving it your time. Get a younger person to join you and share their thoughts with WiseTribe!
Unlived lives: what matters and what does not matter
While we found value in the exercise of going back to our 25-year-old selves, we each have the wisdom to know that lamenting the life we didn’t live at 25 is simply a waste of time. Let’s not waste a second in the now of our lives. Each of us has a productive, purposeful spirit stirring inside of us that can help move the world forward. How do you want to fill your life with meaning, inspiration, creativity and action? Maybe we could do it together, as a tribe.
Check out our blog for more insights on living a purposeful life and other initiatives driven by the members of WiseTribe. Join us to contribute your ideas!
Jacqueline Botting is the founder and a contributing writer to WiseTribe. She is a technology business developer in the U.S. and overseas for start-ups and Fortune 1000s. She’s a proponent of owning less to live more and believes greater contemplative practices in our daily lives and social institutions make our world a better place. She splits her time between LA, NYC and Florida. Connect with Jacqueline on LinkedIn, Twitter or Google +.
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