I don't think I'll live as long as my financial planner thinks I will.

The average male in the US lives 75.6 years. The average Masterson male? Well, my Dad is the current record-holder as far back as anybody can remember. He's 67 and in good health, but so far he is defying the tally sheet.

But this is not a post about morbitity. That would be morbid. This is a post about mutual funds.

I saw a speaker today at the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit who yelled a lot and pointed his finger a lot and smiled a lot on words that most people tend to frown around. But he said something that spoke to me:

"I don't want to fill a retirement account and buy a boat and die some day. I want to have stories to tell..."

I immediately thought of Tyler Durden, who told me not to die without scars. And I thought of my friend Andrew (see: http://t.co/4mulTNe) who encouraged me to live a life story that merits retelling. And then I thought of my financial planner, who told me that I need a safe retirement and buy so much life insurance that Bayla will never have to worry about money when I pass.

I'm saving like I'm going to live to 90. I'm putting money away. While other people starve for want of a meal or freeze for want of a roof or die of malaria for want of a mosquito net, I am squirreling money away on the long shot that, despite generations of evidence to the contrary, I might make it past 80. I'm slowly investing in something that I am reasonably certain I will never ever have the opportunity to enjoy in full, and the remainder of which will be taxed at 50% and handed to my already-grown-and-financially-stable daughter. I am trying to make the wholly imaginary octogenarian years of my life as comfortable as possible.

Let's face it, when I drop that money in the old 401(K), I am really not investing in a storehouse of old-Justin-pills . I'm making myself feel better, now. I'm convincing myself that if only I can invest enough money now, I can avoid the inevitability of my own mortality. I'm buying imaginary water from the Fountain of Youth in tiny decanters.

The problem is, there are lots of people who need that money now. There are lots of ways for that that money could be used to make my story worth telling right now. I think I will squirrel away less, and find something more real, and less imaginary, to do with some of that money now.

I'm not advocating not saving, or being financially irresponsible; just being less focused on trying to pretend to secure an imaginary future. What would happen if you planned as if you were going to die at the average age of 75.6 years (men) or 80.9 years (women), but lived in the realization that some very non-imaginary things may deserve your money now? What would you do differently today, if anything?

Cheers,
Justin

I have a confession to make: there is a dent in my couch in the shape of my ass.

It is a relatively new couch; just a couple of years old. It's a sturdy couch, a nice thick foam-covered-in-leather cushion in the seat...not the loose cotton-stuffing type that lends itself to butt dents. No sir, this is the genuine article... I think it might have been fair for the manufacturer to even tout it as butt-dent-resistant.

This is embarrassing. Do you know how many hours of laying/sitting on a nice leather couch it takes to create a butt dent? A lot. A whole lot. If it were a ten-year-old couch, or one of those well-seasoned couches that goes through the decade-long Couch Circle of Life (living room, family room, basement, college dorm, son/daughter's first apartment, curb, back to someone's living room, repeat) I could understand it. But no, I made that butt-dent through countless unfocused hours of sloggily lazing about on that couch over the last two years. And here's the thing: I didn't even enjoy that time all that much. It would have been one thing if I spent it doing exactly what I wanted to do, but I think I just default to that position; it is a weak sort of "home base" for me when I'm not sure what to do with my time and energy.

I tell you that to tell you this: I have wasted many, many hours of my life and I plan on not doing that anymore, because it's dumb.

It's not about "watching TV is bad," or "vegging out is bad" or "hooray for exercise, now blast those quads!" It's simply about being intentional with one's hours. I'm starting to think that the two greatest blasphemies are squandered time and self-pity, and I dare say that squandered time may be the worse of the two. If I want to watch TV or a movie, I will... but it should be because I want to enjoy the experience. I will dial up the program I want to see, that I chose beforehand, and I will take it in with presence and attention. And when it is over, I will turn it off. I will surf the internet with direction, and if I don't have direction, I will attend to one of the fifty other things I would like to accomplish. In short, I will choose my attention, not piddle away to a static default.

When I was single, I thought I was as busy as any human can get. "Where has all the time gone?" I thought.
When I got married, I was amazed at how much busier I got. "Remember when I was single, and I had all that free time? Where has all that time gone?" I thought.
Then I had a child. And I thought, "What did I do with all of my free time when it was just the two of us? NOW I am busy."
Then I became a half-time single parent. And I frequently think, "What did I do with all of my free time back when I had a partner in parenting and taking care of the home? Where has all that time gone?"

The couch ate it. I will feed it no more.

Cheers,
Justin

It's nice to see you again, blog. It has been far, far too long. May I tell you a story to catch you up a bit?

Very late last night, lit by the last orange embers of a summer campfire, someone smarter than me told me of a book that has inspired him to consider his life as a story, and himself as a character in that story. He asked me if someone were to see my life written as a story or reenacted as a movie, would it be worth reading or watching? Would it be interesting enough to stick around for the ending? Memorable enough to talk about in the break room the next day? Meaningful enough to shed a little light on the reader/viewer's own life? He identified a few elements that make a compelling story: exterior tensions and risks, overcoming adversity, ultimate victory against all odds...but the one that stood out to me most was character arc; the idea that a great story needs its central characters to change to be interesting: Darth Vader goes from well-mannered rambunctious kid to dark lord, Jason Bourne goes from confused and wandering ass-kicking-robot to hero driven by love, Jenny comes back to Forrest to start a family with the only man who ever loved her.

He told me of many intentional choices he and his wife have made and continue to make to live a story worth telling; he did so with neither bravado nor pride, he did so in kind instruction. Then he asked me about my story. I sipped a dram of bourbon from a plastic cup and glanced into the wispy burn of the fire's final moments, and I felt a strange sort of melancholy. It wasn't regret, not exactly; but rather a familiar dull weight in my chest that reminds me that my story is not yet stunning, but that my character is in the middle of a remarkable character arc.

The last year and a half has been, without exaggeration or effect, the most rapidly changing and ultimately character-defining season I have experienced yet. I changed positions in my company twice, adopted a baby, got separated (on the way to divorced) from my wife of eight years and drained the bank account in the process, and have learned to be a half-time single parent of a one-year old. My character today is starting to look pretty different than my character of two years ago.

There are stories within each of these chapters, and these are probably stories worth telling. But I'm not going to, not right now. I am instead going to tell you several things I've learned in the process, in the hopes that in doing so, I might remind myself of my own character arc to date, and even begin to imagine how the outline for the next chapters might look. Here are a few belief changes that have defined and driven my own character arc in the last eighteen months:

• Great marriage is a partnership of self-realized individuals. A married person must love their spouse choicefully and work hard at that relationship, but must never forget that what his/her spouse truly needs is a whole person to be married to... the most important promise I can make to a future spouse, if there should ever be one, might not be "I will forever work on our relationship," but rather "I will forever work on becoming the man I was made to be."
  
  
• Boys are everywhere; men are hard to find. I could write for weeks about this, but many others have already done so, and have done well. A real man is both strong and sensitive, fully present to his life, and ceaseless in his work on himself and his world. He loves the woman and the world into beauty around him.
  
  
• Parenting Is Insanely Hard, and Impossibly Rewarding. Being a single parent with half-custody is not half as hard as being a full-time single parent. It is exactly as hard, just half of the time. I had no idea what parenting really felt like until I was the only person there to do it... and I am so grateful for that chance. I cannot ignore her, hand her off, or wait for someone else to fix her problems for me. When she is with me, I get 100% of the frustration, sadness, and exhaustion, and I get 100% of the reward, love, and sense of satisfaction of actually seeing a real human being grow and flourish in my care. I know this sounds nuts, but I feel really lucky for that.
  
  
• Humility Is the Only Sensible Reality. Humility is not a character trait or a personality bonus, it demonstrates a basic grip on reality. No one; no one who reflects in earnest on the magnificence of the world around him and the simultaneous sacred depth and chaotic absurdity of the human experience can live in arrogance or pride. Our world, our spirit, our experience is too deep and too profound and too ridiculous to merit it. As someone who frequently falls into the insecurity of arrogance, I'm praying that my character remembers this.
  
  
• Hard Work is How You Get Things. File this one under "duh," but somewhere along the line I got the impression that if I dabbled in enough interests for long enough, I would naturally pick them up and find myself a fully-realized man. It turns out I was wrong, and I was lazy. If I want to be fit, I must work hard for a long time. If I want to be informed, I must learn hard for a long time. If I want to be spiritually connected, I must work hard at connecting for a long time. If I wish to become a skilled writer, I must practice hard and for a long time.
  
  
• Self-Pity Is a Curse. I cannot choose actions for others, and I cannot choose what the world will offer me... but I have full control of my choices. Self-pity presumes otherwise on both accounts, and disallows both accountability and gratitude. I may be sad, confused, and lost at times, but I may not pity myself; it is a heresy against all I am given, and all I am able to choose.

I'm sure there are dozens more, but this will do for now. I want to live a life worth retelling; I've no aspiration that the story will actually be retold, but merely that it be worthy of being retold... that I have honored all that I have been given by living a life worthy of it.

It's nice to see you again, blog.

Cheers,
Justin