We promise you that this Facebook post will make you reconsider everything about your life.

We promise you that this Facebook post will make you reconsider everything about your life.

We all know the saying, “life is too short” and more often than not it takes something monumental for this statement to sink in.

It’s so easy to look at others, particularly on social media and think their life is full of love, happiness, friends, babies and enjoyment. It’s important to remember this is just a snapshot of their life, and instead of focusing on how much better their life may seem in a facebook post, start focusing on your own.
The older we get, the more we realize how happiness takes work, having the confidence to smile through the pain.

A Facebook post reminds us to live our life to the fullest.

“I need to get my life off my chest. About me. I’m a 46-year-old banker and I have been living my whole life the opposite of how I wanted. All my dreams, my passion, gone. In a steady 9-7 job. 6 days a week. For 26 years. I repeatedly chose the safe path for everything, which eventually changed who I was. Today I found out my wife has been cheating on me for the last 10 years. My son feels nothing for me. I realized I missed my father’s funeral FOR NOTHING. I didn’t complete my novel, traveling the world, helping the homeless. All these things I thought I knew to be a certainty about myself when I was in my late teens and early twenties. If my younger self-had met me today, I would have punched myself in the face. I’ll get to how that dream was crushed soon.
Let’s start with a description of me when I was 20. It seemed only yesterday when I was sure I was going to change the world. People loved me and I loved people. I was innovative, creature, spontaneous, risk-taking and great with people. I had two dreams. The first was writing a utopic/dystopic book. The second was traveling the world and helping the poor and homeless. I had been dating my wife for four years by then. Young love. She loved my spontaneity, my energy, my ability to make people laugh and feel loved. I knew my book was going to change the world. I would show the perspective of the “bad” and the “twisted” showing my viewers that everybody thinks differently, that people never think what the do is wrong. I was 70 pages through when I was 20. I am still 70 pages in at 46. By 20, I had backpacking around New Zealand and the Philippines. I planned to do all of Asia, then Europe, then America. To date, I have only been to New Zealand and the Philippines.
Now we get to where it all went wrong. My biggest regrets. I was 20. I was the only child. I needed to be stable. I needed to take that graduate job, which would dictate my whole life. To devote my entire life to a 9-7 job. What was I thinking? How could I live, when the job was my life? After coming home, I would eat dinner, prepare my work for the following day and sleep at 10 pm to wake up at 6 am the following day. God, I can’t remember the last time I’ve made love to my wife.
Yesterday my wife admitted to cheating on me for the last 10 years. 10 years. That seems like a long time but I can’t comprehend it. It doesn’t even hurt, She says it because iv changed. I’m not the person I was. What have I been doing in the last 10 years? Outside of work, I really can’t say anything. Not being a proper husband. Not being ME. Who am I? What happened to me? I didn’t even ask for a divorce or yell at her or cry. I felt NOTHING. Now I can feel a tear as I write this, But not because my wife has been cheating on me, but because I am now realizing I have been dying inside. What happened to that fun-loving, risk-taking, energetic person that was me, hungering to change the world? I remember being asked on a date by the most popular girl in the school but declining her for my now-wife. God, I was really popular with the girls in high school. In university/college too. But I stayed loyal. I didn’t explore. I studied every day/
Remember all that backpacking and book-writing I told you about? That was all in the first few years of college. I worked part-time and splurged all that I had earned. Now I save every penny. I don’t remember a time I spend anything on anything fun. On anything for myself. What do I even want now?
My father passed ten years ago. I remember getting calls from mum, telling me he was getting sicker and sicker. I was getting busier and busier, on the verge of a big promotion. I kept putting my visit off, hoping in my mind he would hold on. He died, and I got my promotion. I haven’t seen him in 15 years. When he died, I told myself it didn’t matter what I didn’t see him. I rationalized that being dead, it wouldn’t matter anyway. WHAT WAS I THINKING? Rationalizing everything, making excuses to put things off. Excuses. Procrastination It all leads to one thing, nothing. I rationalized that financial security was the most important thing. I now know, that it definitely is not. I regret doing nothing with my energy when I had it. My passions. My youth. I regret letting my job take over my life. I regret being an awful husband, a money-making machine. I regret not finishing my novel not traveling the world. Not being emotionally there for my son. Being a damn emotionless wallet.
If you’re reading this and you have a whole life ahead of you, please. Don’t procrastinate. Don’t leave your dreams for later. Relish in your energy, your passions. Don’t stay on the internet with all your spare time (unless your passion needs it). Please, do something with your life while you’re young. DO NOT settle down at 20. DO NOT forget your friends, your family. Yourself. Do NOT waste your life. Your ambitions. Like I did mine, Do not be like me.”

That’s his original facebook post:

So here are some tips to do just as the author suggested in his facebook post … and live your life:

1. Figure out what is important to you

Do not do what people want you to do, do what makes you happy. You will always get the opinions of parents, friends, society and your community, but you are the person who will live your life, so do what makes you happy.

2. Take risks

If you never take risks in life, you will undoubtedly be filled with regret. If you don’t take the risks, you won’t get anywhere.

3. Remember to tell people you love them

Everyone wants to know they are special to someone. So make sure you tell your friends and family, partners, that you love them, it will bring a smile to their face I am sure.

4. Live in the now. Learn from your past

You can plan for the future, learn from the past, but it’s important to focus on the present.

5. Don’t compromise your values

If you don’t have a good feeling about something, don’t do it. Often our gut feelings are trying to tell us something and we should listen to them.

6. Be charitable

Even if it’s something as simple as buying a homeless person a cold drink and a sandwich in winter. Donate old clothes to a charity shop, volunteer at a food kitchen. Be nice to others.

We hope that this man’s facebook post touched you. So, the next time you find yourself on Facebook, close it, go tell your sister you love her, and take a walk somewhere, enjoy life, as they say, it is short.