So when I was younger I knew that I would never do anything great, no cure for cancer, famous song, no new technology, or becoming president. It was morbidly depressing to realize that at the end of things I would be forgotten and I would look back at my life and feel I hadn't done anything significant. The more I thought about it, the more this idea became set in my head. A commonly reoccurring nightmare of laying on this bed being moments away from death and regretting what I had and hadn't done. Then I started to realize that life is sort of like going to a theme park, you go in for the day and leave at night, chances are you don't get to do everything you wanted, but what's important is you did the things you wanted to do the most. This idea began to form that it isn’t really relevant what you do, but that you did what you wanted.
A way to explain this is to just imagine that life is like going to the theme park for the day. Many people walk into a park at in the morning and leave at night, but what they go for is often different; some are there for the food, others for the tame rides, and others want to go and ride the biggest scariest roller-coaster there is. When night comes and everyone shuffles out of that theme park each individual will view their day as a success if they did what they wanted. So the person that went to the theme park for food would look at how the roller-coaster enthusiast spent their day, and think what a waste of time to ride roller-coasters and not enjoy this cornucopia of food. The food enthusiast is correct, but only from their own perspective.
The point is your values are what dictate happiness and fulfillment, not societies values. You don't need to save lives or be rich to be fulfilled in life. In fact, it is far too often people try to be rich or save lives and realize too late they are still unsatisfied. The point is if you want to spend your life traveling and seeing the world do it; if you want to become a cop to protect people do it, even if you want to sit at home watching T.V. eating junk food, do it. All that matters is that at the end of your life, you look back at all the bad, good, productive, unproductive things and say I'm happy with the route I traveled, that is when you will be able to die happy on your deathbed.
