I’m 25 – halfway through! Over the last five years, these have helped me a lot:
1. Where do I need to go to find myself?
When you feel “I should go to X country,” really tune in to that feeling. Everyone has a few places they crave to visit and your 20s are the best time to do it, because it’ll help you find yourself.
I went to US, Mexico, Canada, Japan, Korea and Australia in 2012/2013 and studied abroad – now I feel even if I die tomorrow I’ll have seen everything I needed to see.
2. What’s the most impractical career that would make me happy if I got it?
When traveling we often realize what we really want. I fell in love with books during my semester abroad and started dreaming of becoming a writer.
If there’s any time to go for the most impractical career path you can imagine for a few years, it’s your 20s. You can “grow up” later.
3. Why do I want it?
Going for what’s impractical means swimming upstream, and you need balls to do that. Knowing what drives you is the single greatest way to not give a fuck what other people think.
Money, prestige, fame, legacy, freedom, no matter what you’re going for, people always tell you you’re wrong anyway.
Mine is legacy. If you read this and actually change your life because of it, I get goosebumps. Impact is my drug. Might as well accept it.
4. What’s the lowest standard of living I’m willing to tolerate right now?
When you’re 50, you can’t eat pizza three times a day. Your body just won’t be cool with it. Right now, you can sleep on the floor, live on $10 a day, wear the same clothes three days in a row and it won’t matter.
Paying the price of being impractical will never be this easy again.
5. What kind of life do I want to avoid at all costs?
Most of us don’t have a clue what we want when we’re 20, which is why so many people slide into career paths that make them unhappy. Figuring it out is hard, but you can always start with avoiding what you know you don’t want.
I chose a business degree right out of high school, because I thought being a consultant would be cool. Once I saw clearer I realized that that’s one of the last careers I’d want to get into. Knowing one more thing I can avoid makes it easier to navigate.
You don’t need to have all the answers. Just make sure your questions keep getting better.
