In the best seller book and movie titled, "Paper Towns" by John Green the main character Margo says,

“Did you know that for pretty much the entire history of the human species, the average life span was less than thirty years? You could count on 10 years or so of real adulthood, right? There was no planning for retirement, There was no planning for a career. There was no planning. No time for planning. No time for a future. But then the life spans started getting longer, and people started having more and more future. And now life has become the future. Every moment of your life is lived for the future—you go to high school so you can go to college so you can get a good job so you can get a nice house so you can afford to send your kids to college so they can get a good job so they can get a nice house so they can afford to send their kids to college.”

This quote made me think. People spend so much time trying to plan out their whole entire life and focusing on things that really don't matter as much as they think they do. I don't know about you, but I find myself stressing out and thinking about things that aren't as important as other things in my life. I should be using the time that I am dwelling and focusing on those things and switching it over to the things in my life that truly matter to me.

I graduated this past June and although it wasn't all too long ago I don't remember everything that was said. However, one thing really stuck out to me. It was something that a past teacher of mine said during his speech. He talked about how one of the best things that he has done in his life is creating a list. A simple list of 10 things that truly matter to him. Ranked with the most important at number one and so on. He talked about how when things come up in his life, the list helps him choose what he should focus on. If he finds that he is dealing with two things that are on the list at the same time, he focuses on the one that is ranked the highest. I thought that this was absolutely genius.

I decided to try it out myself and I do truly feel that just writing down these 10 things have helped me get a better hold on my life in some way. Hopefully, it will continue to help me and as things get messy down the road the list will help me decide what to focus on and what is the most important.

Here is my life of the top 10 things that truly matter to me:

1. My Family.

2. My Happiness.

3. Experiencing new things.

4. My Friends.

5. Achieving/attempting my goals and dreams.

6. Photography/Art.

7. School (Graduate college and get good grades)

8. Be smart with my money throughout my life.

9. Music.

10. Putting myself out there in the world.

It only takes a few minutes to write down the things that truly matter to you. It helped me and has helped others so why not give it a try! It can't hurt!