Bucket List, Schmucket List. Here's My F#%$ It List.

My 50th birthday is just around the corner.  I would love some time to reflect on my past, evaluate my present and plan for my future, but it doesn't look like I'm going to get it - yet.  My back up plan is to try to steal little snippets of time to winnow things out of my life, streamlining and simplifying in order to make room for clarity and purpose.

In the past I've written mission statements, penned numerous goal lists, and made vision boards - lots and lots of them.  The thing is, they are so packed full of dreams and desires that I can't decide what to focus on first and they are weighing me down; way down.

So this year, I'm cutting and culling - everything.  From my dreams and goals lists to my plastic food containers (my new motto: "if the lid doesn't fit, then you must toss it") and everything in between. 

As Jim Collins, author of  Good to Great, says,  "If you have more than three priorities, then you don't have any."

For my birthday I'm giving myself the gift of lightness; lightness of environment, mind, spirit and (calling all will-power) body.  I am also giving myself the gift of authenticity which might make some people nervous.  I plan on owning my fifty-dom in all it's glory - not trying to look, act or be anything other than who I am. 

I've never really been the type to keep my opinions to myself, but as hard as it may be to believe, I have often moderated my feelings or views in order to keep some semblance of peace and decorum.  At fifty - all bets are off - primarily because at this stage of the game in life most of my friends and family are grown-ups, and as such, should be able to handle truth.

Sounds a wee bit dangerous, doesn't it? 

"Live dangerously and you live right." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe