If you had to give one life-changing tip, what would it be?
Here’s mine. It’s the one thing I wish someone had grabbed me by the shoulders and told me years ago. It’s the thought I come back to on the good days and the one that’s carried me through the darkest ones.
You only live once. Everyone’s heard that. It’s on t-shirts, tote bags, and roughly 40% of Instagram bios. But there’s another version of it that gets said a lot less, and honestly means a lot more.
You’re only young once.
The Problem With Living for “Someday”
I used to be a planner. Not the fun kind with mood boards and Pinterest holidays. The kind who mapped out a life plan and then poured every ounce of focus into ticking it off, box by box, milestone by milestone. Career, ladder, five-year targets, all of it lined up neatly like dominoes.
The problem with a plan like that is it’s very easy to miss out on everything happening around it while you’re staring straight ahead at the next box. So here’s the deviation clause I wish I’d built in from the start: it’s okay to go off script. You genuinely have no idea what’s waiting for you if you do.
Why “I’ll Do It When I Retire” Doesn’t Hold Up
So many people build a bucket list for retirement. A folder of dreams they’ll get to once the mortgage is paid off and the kids have moved out and there’s finally, finally time.
But think about what that actually assumes. It assumes the money will be there when you get there. And even if it is, it assumes your knees, your back, and your stamina will still be up for it. Will you still be able to hike Mount Rinjani in Indonesia at 70? Will you want to spend a full day wandering Pompeii under open sun with zero shade, or walk the cobbled hills of Edinburgh’s Old Town for hours on end?
Maybe. But maybe not. And “maybe not” is a heavy bet to place on the things you actually want to do with your one life.
What Happened When My Plan Fell Apart
Then my life crumbled. Not in the dramatic movie-trailer sense, just quietly and completely, the way these things tend to. The plans fell apart, and so did I, a bit. The ambitions I’d spent years building towards suddenly felt pointless. I’d lost my sense of purpose almost overnight.
And where better to go looking for yourself than far away from everything you know?
So I started packing bags and travelling every chance I got. Somewhere in that process, I felt a weight lift that I hadn’t even realised I was carrying. A different version of me started showing up, one who wasn’t constantly living three steps ahead.
I started actually enjoying things in the here and now instead of filing them away under “future plan, TBC.” Because why spend your life looking forward to something you’re already capable of doing today? That one trip, that one decision to go, might be the thing that quietly changes the direction of everything that follows.
Go and Live It
So that’s my one tip. Go out and see the world. Step outside the bubble you know so well and let it actually teach you something. Learn from every place you land in, every stranger who becomes a five-minute friend, every dish that doesn’t taste like anything back home, every experience that scares you a little before it changes you a lot.
You’ll only live once. But you’re only young once too. Don’t let the first one talk you out of the second.
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