I love a Good Bucket List

Long before there was a SheHive, there was The Mighty Girlfriends Club - a group of friends I invited to gather at a restaurant on the west side to “make stuff happen.” I asked everyone to bring a list of 100 things they wanted to do in their life time and share it at our first gathering - the thought being that, wherever a group of women gather, someone knows how to “make stuff happen.”

And I wasn’t disappointed. Nearly all of us had “shoot a gun” on our list (ironic considering how incredibly left-leaning my circle is) and, of course, someone in the room knew how to make it happen. One girlfriend’s brother was a certified firearms instructor. A few weeks later he and his wife (also a certified instructor) escorted a group of us to a local firing range, brought along a gaggle of guns, and one-by-one showed us how to properly load, shoot and unload a gun.

​And by the way, I don’t ev-ah need to do that again.

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Yes, they're unloaded

Check out my bullseye!

I’ve kept a Mighty Life List ever since - usually about 100 things I want to contribute, experience or learn in this lifetime. I love to visit it every so often to see what I can check off as done. So far, in no particular order, I have checked off:

Start a Mighty Girlfriends Club
Shoot a gun
Live in Detroit proper
Grow sunflowers
Start a compost bucket
Live in a home with two bathrooms
Have a garage and/or shed
Have a walk-in closet (it’s called my basement)
Have a kitchen with enough space for everything
Find five people I can truly call friend
Make a difference in a child’s life
Attend a sweat lodge
Exercise for 30 days straight
Quit smoking
Hold Downward Facing Dog for any length of time
Ride a Segway (pics or it didn't happen!)
Splurge on an Athleta shopping spree (turned out that a “splurge” at Athleta was three things)
Eat ice cream on the Santa Monica pier
Drive the Pacific Coast Highway
Earn a Master’s degree
Have $0 credit card debt
Karaoke (on Bourbon Street, no less!)
Visit Sedona
Parasail (three times now)
Have 6 months of expenses in a savings account
Reconnect with my best friend from childhood, Gaby Prouty
Participate in at least one Detroit Restaurant Week
Own a home in my name
Find permanent, part-time, flexible work in culture or training (those who know the true story of where I work part-time when not at the SheHive are surely rolling their eyes and muttering, “Careful what you wish for,” right now)
Build a playground
Complete a 21 Day Gratitude Challenge
Get paid to speak
Purchase one outrageously expensive purse
Plan my friend, Sandie’s, wedding
Try kimchi
Dance burlesque (again, pics or it didn't happen!)
Participate in a drum circle
Wear a fresh-picked Hibiscus flower in my hair, in Hawaii
Have a fenced in backyard
Start a podcast

Life on the Other Side of Should

The last one, the podcast, has been a dream for over three years now. I’m thrilled to share that the SheHive finally released our podcast, Life on the Other Side of Should, last week. Please give it a listen. We’ll be releasing a new episode every Sunday on the website and later in the week on our Facebook page. Having already recorded eight episodes, the process of getting a podcast live is no big deal - but it was a very big deal for a long time.

Until it wasn’t.

We Never Know

In fact, most of the items I have accomplished seemed like such a big deal - a mighty big goal - when I added them to the list. Turned out that all of them were achievable. We never know how much we are truly capable of until we allow ourselves to be vulnerable enough to claim, out loud, what we really want.

There is Still Much to Do

I still have plenty on my list to accomplish - bathe in an outdoor bath in Costa Rica, join the Distinguished Clown Corps, walk the Camino de Santiago, earn a Doctorate, write and publish a book (actively working on it!), and - my favorite - finding a coping mechanism that I enjoy as much as carbohydrates… along with 70+ other entries (I keep a running list on Google Keep).

And There is Some Not to Do

I also visit the list periodically to see if there are entries that no longer serve me and need to be removed. Because the truth is, as soon as we start reaching towards our goals, we learn something about ourselves - or the world at large - that have the potential to change our trajectory. It’s important that we always remember that we have the authority to change our direction when needed.

The me I am today is so much wiser than the me that create the last iteration of the list.

What’s on Your Bucket List?

What’s on your bucket list, lovely? What do you want to experience, learn or contribute to this world while you’re still here? I’d love to hear about your dreams! Drop a line in the comments below or shoot me an email at hello@theshehive.com.

​With much love and gratitude,