How to make each day truly memorable

If you want to make a mark on history, fill your days with endless new experiences. Here are ideas to get you started.

What you need to know:

  • Make something you’re proud of with your own hands, like writing a book. Learn to cook at least one great meal beautifully.

  • Avoid the Internet, television, radio and newspapers for a week. Instead, really talk to your friends and family. And read a book on something you’ve never thought of trying before. It could change your whole life.

  • Give up alcohol for 28 days. Or try out vegetarianism.

For most of us, every day’s pretty much the same — with few experiences so impressive that you’ll remember them all your life. All those drinking sessions will merge into one vague memory. Your ever posher phones all forgotten.

So if you want a truly memorable life, what should you do with your days?

First make sure the basics are in place.

Find work that you’re passionate about, and put a lower priority on wealth and possessions.

Find love. Being with the right person, who shares your values and loves you unconditionally, is the best thing that can ever happen to you. However good life is as an individual, your life will be far richer as a couple. Make it a conscious, fulfilling relationship. Fully committed. Honest and faithful.

Have children — and love them. It’s a feeling that can’t be described but only experienced.

New experience

After that, you need to start planning. Make a list of everything you’ve ever thought about doing, big, small, crazy or sensible. And start organising to do them. Fill your days with endless new experiences! Here’s a few ideas to get you started.

Tackle something you’re really afraid of, like making a speech, spiders, failure or rejection. Work with an expert to overcome your particular fear.

Learn something completely new. A musical instrument? Photoshop? Woodwork? Driving? Follow it all the way to world class standards. Put all your effort into something at least once in your life.

Become expert at a strategy game like chess or Go.

Study the scriptures. Not just what they say, but where they came from, who wrote them and why.

Something larger

Make a pilgrimage. Perhaps to Jerusalem, Rome or Mecca. Or a prehistoric site. Or one of the great music centres. Somewhere you can feel something larger than yourself.

Memorise a poem. Work abroad — and get to really understand another culture.

Climb a mountain. Cross the whole country on a bicycle. Or on foot. Watch a whole sunrise or sunset. Experience a solar eclipse. See and feel snow.

Run a marathon. Or master a martial art. Learn how to enjoy great sex and how to be a wonderful lover. Go skinny dipping together. Dance in the rain.

Get closure on any past unhappiness. Or if you have any sort of mental illness, get the best possible advice and treatment.

Make something you’re proud of with your own hands, like writing a book. Learn to cook at least one great meal beautifully.

Avoid the Internet, television, radio and newspapers for a week. Instead, really talk to your friends and family. And read a book on something you’ve never thought of trying before. It could change your whole life.

Give up alcohol for 28 days. Or try out vegetarianism.

Stand up to a bully. Speak out against a fraud. Start a movement about something you believe in. Spread the word, educate others, and inspire them to join you. Who knows? You might make a mark on history…