When Is Your Finish Line?

Write down the vision; Make it plain upon tablets, so that the one who reads it may run. – Habakkuk 2:2 (NAB)

I was introduced to the concept of “begin with the end in mind” by Stephen Covey in his book “The 7 Habits of Highly Successful People”. 

It is a great concept. Decide what you want your life to look like and spend each day working towards your desired outcome. There are a lot of issues with this concept. Your goal can seem incredibly far off, you lose faith and quit, you can feel like you are not making any progress and you can feel like you don’t have enough time to accomplish your goals. 

The first thing we must do is enjoy the journey. If we only expect joy at the destination, we’ll never have joy because the destination will always move. There will always be bigger goals to chase. 

The next thing is to reconsider how much time you have to accomplish your goals. This is the concept that was cemented in my brain by Dan Sullivan’s book, “My Plan to Live to 158.” If you had a lot more time on this earth what could you accomplish? Would you dream bigger dreams?

Here is the exercise to reconsider your timeline on this earth.

I had a buddy of mine go through this recently and it has completely changed how he is living today. It did the same for me. Try it for yourself. 

Grab a blank sheet of paper and write your answers down as you go. Writing your answers down is key!

1 – How old will you be when you die? We all have a year in mind, we just don’t like to talk about it. Write it down.

2 – Consider some facts: (answers at the bottom of the article)

2a – How many people in the United States will be 100+ years old in 2025?

2b – What is the oldest age anyone has reached?

2c – Tech trends – The computers that put a man on the moon in 1969 had similar computing power to what gaming system?

3 – One year before your planned demise, take a look at your life. How will your life look in the following categories: Spiritual/Faith, Social/Relationships, Intellectual/Knowledge, Physical, and Financial. Take one category at a time and write down what your life will be like in that category one year before your assumed date of death. 

4 – Based on the person you described above, what is the % likelihood that you will die within 1 year (remember – you just described yourself 1 year before your planned demise).

5 – If your answer to question 3 was a low percentage, how many more years would you like to live?

6 – What big dreams would you like to accomplish with those years?

The years you just added in question 5 are bonus years. In your mind, you didn’t have those years when you started this exercise. 

For me, this change in thinking is dramatically changing how I live today. I take more risks. I work harder at creating a work-life and home-life that I don’t want to retire from. I work harder on my health. I get less excited about short-term setbacks (still working on this one!). 

My life today is dramatically different because I decided to live to 128 years old. Why 128? Because I decided I’d like to celebrate the 2100 New Year with my family. My oldest child will be 88. Her kids will be in their 50-60’s (my grandkids). Her kids’ children  (my great-grandkids) will be in their 30-40’s and their kids (my great-great grandkids) will be in their teens. 

That is exciting to me and something I want to be in great shape for (mentally, physically, spiritually, financially, etc.). Could I be wrong and die a lot sooner? Absolutely! Will my current life be better because I set the goal? Absolutely!

There are some stumbling blocks on this road to longevity. We’ll cover some ways around those next week. 

* Answers to above – 2a – 120,000; 2b –  122 years and 164 days – Jeanne Calment of France passed away in 1997; 2c – 2 Nintendo Entertainment Systems (circa 1985)

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