Living a meaningful life

As I get older, I get a different perspective of life and realize that some things that used to be important to me have changed and others not. My focus on my career and job was highest after graduating and somewhat shifted to, what I would consider a more balanced state, once I became a father. I also think that it is likely to keep changing as my life continues.

I have seen people around me experiencing regret and mentioning that they had put too much emphasis on work or chasing financial success and not enough time on what really mattered (in hindsight) which was relationships and connections.

I am coming to think that there isn’t a “right” way to live our life and that there are periods of our life that will require a different allocation of our time and focus. I think it is useful ensure we do not sidetracked to have step backs and assess if the direction we are taking is the right one. I think a useful mental exercise in doing so is projecting ourselves in the future and asking our future self what are the things that he/she would be proud to have done. What are the things that mattered to us?

With this reflection in the background, here’s a list of things or recommendation I believe my future self would give me.

• Foster human connections
• Make a positive societal contribution
• Grow by challenging your own limits
• Experience life with emotions
• Use logic and first principles to analyze problems but not to the cost of not connecting with ones internal state.

I will be interested to get back to this list to modify and/or expand it as time goes by.