Consider Your Life From a Vantage Point of Regret. This Can Help You Make Better Decisions.

Are you happy with where and how you’re allocating your time?

image by Fabrizio Verrecchia from Unsplash.com

If today were your last day on earth, how might you spend that time?

Let’s zoom out from such a narrow span and say, what about if you had six months left to live? What might you do differently? How would you live?

And now, how about if you had one year left on this earth?

Or five years remaining to be alive?

Here is the thing: we don’t know how long any of us has. It’s unlikely, though it’s possible, that you might only have one of those timeframes left to live.

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.” — Steve Jobs

The way you spend today is how you are spending your life.

Are you happy with where you’ve allotted your time?

Did you put your focus and energy toward things that fulfill you? Towards things that make you feel good? Towards your physical and emotional health? Towards significant goals in your life? Towards the relationships that are important to you?

Or, did you spend time on lots of obligations? Things that bore you? Stuff that made you angry or sad? Things that do not fulfill your soul? Stuff that harms your health, mental or physical?

“For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: ‘If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?’ And whenever the answer has been ‘No’ for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.” — Steve Jobs

It’s true, there are aspects of our daily lives that are not always going to delight us, though which are still important that we do. Changing our children's diapers, picking up our dog’s poop, attending that dull routine meeting at work, working on one particular project for our job that does not interest…