What Do You Really Want?
Where do you see yourself in 10 years? Are you working the same job? Maybe you’ve received a promotion? Maybe you bought a slightly bigger house? Own a newer luxury car? Still putting bits and pieces away in a retirement account to maybe be able to retire at age 60? 70? Ever?
Now imagine that money were not a factor and that you have all the income you need. Imagine you can live whatever lifestyle you would desire to live without having to work. In that scenario what would your ideal day look like? Your week? Your month? Or your year? What would give you the maximum fulfillment and joy in your day-to-day life? Now compare those answers to how you answered the question of where you saw yourself in 10 years. Were they the same answer? I doubt it but why not?!
Most people do not give this any real thought. They do not allow themselves to dream about how they would live if they were financially free. Because they don’t see it as an obtainable goal, they simply resign themselves to the notion of having to work for forty or fifty years before they have that freedom and luxury. They are just going through the motions of life. Their 10-year goals of having slightly nicer stuff and a slightly better job. Just keeping up with the Jones’. Why not re-write the script and have the 10-year goal of living the good life and financial freedom? Why not have a goal of gaining complete ownership of every hour of your day?
WHAT IS YOUR IDEAL LIFE?
First you need to know; What do you actually want in life? What makes you happiest? Think about what your ideal day-to-day life looks like. PLEASE take the time to deeply reflect on this and figure out exactly what type of life would give you the most personal satisfaction. This is perhaps one of the most crucial mental exercises you can do. How can you optimize your happiness if you do not know what it is that would make you the happiest? Take the time to get to know your true self and what really makes you tick.
Once you can answer those questions the first thing you should start doing is implementing as many of the things into your life as you possibly can right now in your free time, weekends, and vacations. Start living as closely to your ideal life as you possibly can today. Then use the idea of living that life 24/7 as the motivational push to do whatever it takes to pursue your financial freedom. Think of how glorious it would be if every hour of the day were yours to do with as you please. Take that and use it as the catalyst to tenaciously start pursuing financial freedom.
START OPTIMIZING YOUR LIFE NOW
Knowing what type of day-to-day life would optimize your happiness is huge! Not only can you focus on doing as many of those things right now to add in as much fulfillment in life as you can immediately, but now you can also figure out exactly how much passive income you need to live that life 24/7. It will no longer be some arbitrary number just floating around. It will be a concrete target. Giving you the motivation to really work for it because you know exactly what you would actually do once you obtain. Now you know exactly what you would do with your day, week, month, and year if you were financially free. Calculate exactly how much passive income you would need HERE. Establish that concrete number to shoot for to support your ideal life. There’s a good chance it’s much lower than you thought it would be.
Before I figured out what my ideal life would look like I had just picked an arbitrary number for an annual passive income goal. It wasn’t based on anything other than I thought it sounded good. I chose it primarily because I thought it sounded like an impressive number. I just assumed that it would high enough to support a good life, but I didn’t know what that life would look like. After I spent the time to figure out exactly what type of life I would want to live, and the person I would want to be, I was able to calculate budget based on that lifestyle. The amount of annual passive income I would need to support that lifestyle was shockingly less (50% less!!) than my arbitrary target.
MOVING FORWARD
Determining what lifestyle you would ideally live, the life that will provide you with highest levels of joy and satisfaction, is of the utmost importance, and is a great introspective learning experience. If you don’t know what type of life would give you fulfillment, not only do you not know how to optimize your happiness right now, you don’t have a concrete goal of an ideal lifestyle to shoot for. It may take you weeks, months, or longer to figure out. It will most likely involve some trial and error too. But the important thing is that you figure it out.
When you have a solid idea of that life, use the idea of living it 24/7 as the motivation to work towards your financial freedom. Think about being able to use every hour of the day however you please. Do not be content with 10-year goals of living your same life with a slightly nicer job title and slightly stuff just keeping up with the Jones’. Set your sights on complete freedom to live your ideal life. It is possible. We did it in just seven years. We want to help you achieve that too.
Related Posts:
Passive Income – The Key to the Good Life
Fortune Favors The Bold
