What Would My 80-Year-Old Self Say?: Thinking About the Future

This is a series about looking back and living with no regrets. I consider how I should go about my life so as to not let my eighty-year-old self down by not regretting a single decision and having memories worth remembering. In essence: How would my eighty-year-old self look back on my decisions? What advice would she give me?

Right now I’m in graduate school and my future is uncertain. Although it’s a scary idea not knowing what’s going to happen and where I’ll be in five, ten, or fifty years, I like that I have my whole life ahead of me. It’s like a challenge, a blank canvas, a book opened at the first page, and I can choose any path I want that doesn’t have a locked gate.

(Paths behind locked gates are ones that aren’t open to me yet, such as jobs that I don’t have enough experience for and life decisions that I haven’t met the right person for, etc.)

But eventually, as I go along one of the routes, I’ll hopefully find all of the keys I need to all the gates I want to open.

Whether I end up taking Path #1 or Path #4, I don’t want to regret anything along the way. I want to look back and know that I choose the best pathway for myself, that I don’t regret anything, even if I made many mistakes en route (because I know I will).

Obviously, I can’t possibly know which decisions will be bad ones or which ones won’t work out, but I also don’t know which ones will bring success, happiness, and lead me to even better paths. And isn’t that the whole point? Although I wish we could see through the window above the sink into the future, our lives would be boring and sad because we’d know the ending. Instead our lives are like mystery novels that we can’t read the end of. Though doesn’t the suspense just kill you sometimes?

Anyway, I think my eighty-year-old self would say, “Don’t worry, everything will fall into place.” She would tell me to simply make the decisions that are right for me at the time, and not fret so much about the future. (The older me is such a smart gal and she looks great!)

So if you’re worried about the future or if you’ve come to a gate but don’t have the key, just listen to older me: Don’t fret, and take it one day at time.   

(Picture found via Bing)