We’ve all heard the cliche, “live every day as if it is your last,” but how often do we think about what it actually means? I know that I often get so caught up in the day-to-day and then I forget that I’m here for more than just checking items off of my to-do list.
It is so easy to get so focused on keeping up with work, taking care of my family, and running errands that everything else gets ignored–including Bucket List items.
When Reddit user Something-Creative- posed a question, it really got people thinking about what they hoped to accomplish during their life. They wrote, “A friend of mine asked me this question recently and it was tough to answer. Wanted to hear what you guys have to say.”
A few different users threw out the most exciting places they’d love to travel. One wanted to skydive and learn how to fly. Another even mentioned a dream to visit a wolf sanctuary.
Whether you’re looking for some inspiration for your own bucket list, or just plain curious (and trust us, there are some strange ones), these are the things people revealed they want to do before they die.
1. Help People With Disabilities Become Independent.
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Talk about a noble life goal. Redditor A_Chocolate_Starfish says that this dream sounds “absolutely ridiculous,” but we think otherwise.
“I really want to start a [non-profit] that helps people with developmental disabilities.”
They go on to specify they first want to focus on folks in their own state, and that their goal is to “help [people with disabilites] find volunteers to [help them] reach their goals towards independence. We have tons of nonprofits and some state agencies that do components of this, but to have a place where people with DD can build an unpaid support system and design their own life plan (with assistance) and activities.”
“I would absolutely love that,” they conclude.
The Redditor works at a state agency but feels like this non-profit could help in ways the government is often restricted. “I manage and do large statewide policy change and program design, but at the end of the day, I would love to see the micro level. I always wish I could do more.”
2. See The Northern Lights
[image_with_caption text=”NPS /Neal Herbert/Flickr” image=”https://itsblossom.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/34591364380_d0cea50034_k.jpg” url=”https://flickr.com/photos/yellowstonenps/34591364380/in/photolist-UGHMu9-98asTg-m4nzpP-BEcWEK-DxwnDP-oTidcW-qMkFjF-ehx6uQ-ehx6Gq-ehx6hQ-7nh1nU-dfUtcd-ehrsQa-rofPB1-dMxPqG-qxSLzf-p3mvTD-4qa9ev-dMxPwo-e8pbhk-4qecPQ-pKPkLx-2fnoWxn-9e8ApG-TazWe5-p1J2jz-PG9ekd-3bGjb-e8p2oX-e8p1Hp-bsZt3Y-az1yDd-nnwoTc-iV292b-jKKQoS-2bdWjW4-25Vtjxe-G1iR66-TvRGU9-bBXQ4R-hX1ZRD-bJqdEr-9pXrQP-e8uJvC-e8uKXA-e8p3mx-dfzmDv-bpxPmV-depjGd-e8uHwm”]
This is a once in a lifetime opportunity and it makes for a great addition to any bucket list.
“I want to see the Aurora Borealis,” writes HolyFishKnight on Reddit.
“I want to be in the middle of a frozen tundra away from everything, just my girlfriend and myself looking up in awe.”
This natural light show is only seen way up north.
According to the Space Weather Prediction Center, this beautiful displayed is caused by electrons colliding with oxygen and nitrogen atoms and molecules.
3. High Five A Penguin
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This dreamer might never see their bucket list become reality. Have you ever wanted to high five a penguin?
Reddit user nickachu_ thinks this is the ultimate “before I die,” goal.
“Go to Antarctica and high five a penguin,” they share.
It wasn’t long before another commenter bashes these bucket list ideas, saying “I’ve done 3/4 that. Sorry, penguins don’t high five. They did walk up to about 1 meter of me though.”
4. Go Off The Grid
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Getting away is the ultimate bucket list addition for this Redditor.
“Live out of a van or truck for a few years with no cell phone,” he writes.
“Just travel around with no specific destination or goal.” The chance to leave work and the noise of social media behind sounds like a dream come true to me, too. I hope they get their chance live their life off the grid for awhile.
5. Experience True Love
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“I want to be in love with someone who loves me back,” started Redditor SirRedentor.
Strangely, the other item on their list is kind of the opposite of falling in love.
“I’d also like to be in a fight that leaves both myself and the other guy with physical scars,” SirRedentor concluded. Um, live your truth, we guess?
6. Go To Maldives
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This trip honestly sounds like paradise. The perfect getaway is exactly what quesoandcats wants to accomplish before they reach the end of their life.
“I’d love to visit the Maldives and stay in one of those cool over-water bungalows.”
“It would be crazy expensive but it’s my dream vacation,” they say.
“Same,” agrees kenyan12345. “That’s my dream honeymoon whenever that happens. Looks absolutely amazing.”
7. Live Forever
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At the very least, this Redditor wants to live a good, long time. Don’t we all?
“Live to be 100 and not deteriorate much mentally or physically.”
“[And] then be that guy on a talk show that everyone says, ‘Look at how young he seems, I can’t believe he’s 100, what the f***,'” comments GuidoVido.
Another commenter stepped in and offered a little encouragement for this ambition.
They said their aunt has is now 103 and doing just great, even passing for a “youthful 80.”
8. Lead a Simple Life
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When it comes to living well, sometimes it’s the little things that matter the most.
“I just want to be able to live a happy comfortable life,” says Redditor Foles.
“I have a beautiful woman that I’m in love with, and we’ve been lucky enough to travel to some interesting places in the short time we’ve been together — Hawaii, Canada, Iceland in 2 months.”
“Checking off some more of my travel destinations would be a good start.”
I really want to have a lengthy visit to Chile with a stop in Easter Island. Norway, Iceland, Glacier National, Switzerland, Alaska have always been places I’ve been dying to go see.”
9. Become A Social Media Star
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The dream? Hit that magic number online.
“Get 100,000 subscribers on my YouTube channel. Nearing 4,000 now,” writes courtesyflush29.
“I am unique. I do public restroom reviews mainly but also abandoned places I stumble upon. Upload every night at 12:01 am. Channel name is TheGearShots if this interests you at all.” We are a bit intrigued!
10. Get Insulted By Gordon Ramsey
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Not many people would put “get berated by a celebrity” on their bucket list, but Redditor FluffyPhoenix does.
They would love to be ribbed by the king of insults, Gordon Ramsey.
“I can’t cook, I can only imagine…” they quip. Would Gordon Ramsey be nice to this person, like he is with his kid contestants? Or would he eviscerate this person on the spot? Hopefully they get their wish–and we can all find out.
11. Go To Space
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Going to space might have been an impossible bucket list decades ago, but with the advent of space tourism, it could become a reality — or at least Redditor samzeman hopes so.
“Go to space. I know it’s not likely, but since I’ve been young I’ve been building towards it.”
“I work with technology or space companies, and I plan (doesn’t everyone) to accumulate enough [money] to get on a tourism spaceflight, as soon as they’re available. I’m too short for the equipment and don’t have the specific knowledge or training to be an experimental cosmonaught, but one day…”
12. Make A Positive Impact On Humanity
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There is nothing quite like know you have left your mark on the world–which is exactly what Redditor noleft wants to do.
“I want to do work that will help the world.”
At the time of posting, this Redditor was interviewing for a job that would allow them to do just that. And how admirable is it that their first desire is to help others?
“I also want to become financially independent.”
“I also want to travel.” These all sound like really great goals and it sounds like one is about to become a reality.
13. Visit A Wolf Sanctuary
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“Well, I don’t really have much of a bucket list to be honest because I just want to let life happen,” Redditor TheDarknessIsIn starts. But they do have one thing they wouldn’t mind doing before they kick the bucket: go to a wolf sanctuary.
“Once I found out [wolf sanctuaries] exist, I knew it would be an awesome place to go!”
And they were surprised they actually existed. “I mean, I knew that there’s honest people that either rescued actual wolves and kept them as pets with a license or they rescued or kept wolf dogs, but I didn’t know that there’s people out there that end up making a pack of their own to rescue them!”
They would also love to own a wolf.
“I also want to rescue a wolf for a pet with a license or have a wolf dog, but I know I couldn’t have a whole sanctuary for my own…too much money.”
14. Travel Their Own Path
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The world is made up of all kinds of people, and it’s OK if your dream doesn’t look like the status quo. Redditor MrJelly90 explained how he planned to lead his life.
“To generally live an accomplished life by my own standards.”
“By that, I have a real focus to not live my life by what I think of as the expected standard for my generation I don’t want children. I don’t want a marriage, and I don’t even want a relationship.
“I want to try and see as much of the world as possible before I am physically unable to do so.”
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“I want to try and help as many people as possible along the way. I have no real goals or aspirations, more a yearning for a peaceful and serene lifestyle.”
15. Thank An Old Friend
Not all bucket list ideas are grandiose in nature. Redditor treemonkey0 simply wants to acknowledge an important person from their past.
“[I want to] visit the grave of an elderly lady who I know when I was a child and was very kind to me.”
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“I was 6 years old. My parents had split up for good. Mother got custody of us kids. She was a mentally ill, abusive monster. We moved into a new neighborhood into a 2 family apartment house where we would live for about 6 years.”
“Our next door neighbor was an elderly lady in her late 60s-early 70s. She owned the 2 family apartment house next door to us. She lived in the first floor apartment while renting out the second floor apartment of her building.”
“Out of the goodness of her heart she used to feed me cookies, candy, and big bowls of ice cream all the time.”
“And knowing I loved to read the comics from the sunday newspaper, would collect and give to me the comics of Sunday newspapers from various out of state papers because they carried comic strips that werent being printed in the local paper.”
“I was just some poor, put upon, abused street kid.”
“Yet this lady showed me nothing but true kindness. I was thinking about her recently, wondering whatever happened to her. So I did a google search which revealed that she passed away in 1991 and is buried in Massachusetts. Someday I intend to go there just to say to her, ‘Thanks.'”
We’re not crying, you’re crying!
16. Experience All The Adrenaline Rushes
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It can be hard to settle on a single dream when there is so much to do and see in the world.
For this Redditor, the goals seem to be all about getting an adrenaline rush from some of the most exciting things life has to offer.
“Picking a number one is hard,” writes Reddit user UnreliableChemist. “[I] would like to skydive, fly, drive a single-seater, and do at least one motor race.”
17. See The World
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Travel is a common bucket list item and this user has quite the list.
“[I want to] do a bit of a tour of Europe. Iceland, Ireland, Germany, the UK, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden. Lots of places to go,” writes Reddit user robexib. Sounds like it is time to start saving for airfare and hotel accommodations, robexib.
18. Leave Their Mark
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It may seem overwhelming to think about, but this Reddit user wants to make the world a better place.
The first place they plan to start? Their own country.
While it isn’t clear where Ex0tictoxic is from, we’re pretty certain every country has problems of their own.
“[I want to] make a real change to make my country a better place,” they wrote on Reddit. “That is all I want, really.”
19. Do Absolutely Nothing
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Traveling is great, skydiving is great, but nothing beats the chance to kick back and relax. Taking a lot of time off of work is a great way to do that.
“I want to be able to afford to just literally do nothing for a month,” writes one Reddit user.
“No work, no responsibilities, just nothing. Just do what I want to do. No work, no one asking anything of me. Just literally nothing.” Um, where do we sign up?
20. Spend Quality Time Alone
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Do you ever just feel like there is something you need to do, even if it might cause the people around you to get upset? That’s what Redditor fat_doofus feels like, as they want to spend a lot of time alone.
“I want to spend some time totally, completely alone.”
“At least a year, maybe longer if it works out alright. I don’t mean single, I don’t mean a homebody who’s addicted to social media. I mean alone. Squatting in an abandoned shack or something somewhere with no internet connection, living off of savings. Never speaking, never interacting with another human being at all. Just completely, utterly alone.”
“I can’t really explain why I want that.”
“It’s just something I very deeply feel like I need to do. I think about it a lot, and how happy I’d be just stripping my life of all the clutter and noise of society.”
They don’t know how to go about it, though.
“I haven’t figured out a way to do it that wouldn’t be deeply damaging to my relationships with my friends and loved ones. And I don’t have enough savings yet to do it anyway. But I think I’m going to hike the Appalachian Trail, start to finish, buy a one-way plane ticket to anywhere in the world where nobody knows me–even better if I can’t speak the language–and just exist in complete solitude for a while.”
21. Go To Burning Man
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For the uninitiated, Burning Man is a nine-day event in the middle of the Nevada desert. It’s full of musical performances, art installations, and illicit substances. This is where Redditor YourAverageSuperhero wants to go.
“I’ve seen it in a bunch of movies and thought it was really cool.”
“Then I told my dad what I thought about it (he’s in his 50s), and he got all excited because since he was 20 he always want to go.” The Redditor adds that it might not be the best idea to take substances in the desert with their dad, but they don’t take it off the table completely.
22. Create A Shared Journal
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Redditor WolverineJive_Turkey admits that this dream is “kind of strange,” but they still want to do it anyway. They want to share a short personal anecdote with strangers.
“I want to buy a big notebook and write on the first page my name, the date, and a short story of something that’s happened in my life.”
“On the last page, I want to write my return address. I want to send this notebook to a random address in the states and that person do the same. Then they send it, repeat, etc.”
“I would like for this notebook to make it all around the world,” they said.
“When it eventually gets back to me I can read all these stories of people from all over and maybe they could include a simple picture and everyone can read everyone else’s to that point. I just don’t know how successful this could be.”
The Redditor updated their post, saying they bought notebooks. We’re keeping our fingers crossed!
23. Invent Several New Sports
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Redditor aminsalem11 has big plans for two new sports: Football II and Baseball II. We were intrigued, and fortunately, they explained the details of each of these new games they plan to develop and patent.
“Football II”
“Two perpendicularly intersecting football fields with a team at each end. Each player is armed with a baton. In the middle is a singular football. All you have to do is get the football into any TD Zone.” Okay, so far we’re following.
“Here’s the catch: at random times, a wild animal is released onto the field.”
“It might be a rabbit, it might be a grizzly bear.” This is where they lost us a bit.
“Baseball II”
While the first sport seems to have some sort of merit (aside from the whole wild-animal-gladiator aspect), this one might be a joke. It involves baseball mitts that can diffuse grenades, pepper spray, and dog shock collars for the audience. We’ll pass, but dream on!
What about you? What is the one thing you’d like to do before you die?
