As you can imagine, I spend a lot of time thinking about life goals. It is my favorite conversation topic and the subject of most of the books and movies that I enjoy.

Today, I’d like to see how far we can push this topic. Below is the grandest, most outrageous life goal that I can reasonably see myself completing. This goal is not on my Life List so I am not focusing on it right now. That said, it is a candidate for taking my focus after I finish my Life List.

Now without further ado…

How To Speak To The World

My grandest, most outrageous (while still being realistic) life goal is to learn to speak to the world. To do this, I would need to become fluent in the world’s five most widely-spoken languages. Those five languages are (as measured by number of native speakers):

  1. Mandarin
  2. Spanish
  3. English
  4. Hindi/Urdu
  5. Arabic

If I attempt this, it is going to be a doozy. Currently I can only speak one language, English. I took spanish in High School but failed Spanish 1 twice. After I got through that, I failed Spanish 2 twice. I tried again when I lived in Argentina but failed at that as well. Most recently, I tried when I lived in Spain. Another failure.

Becoming bilingual is on my Life List so I will definitely be learning at least one of these languages before my tattooed deadline. But the prospect of learning all five is almost overwhelming.

I feel as if I can accomplish anything but for some reason, learning a new language has beaten me so far. That is why I am considering it for my next Life List. It scares me and I like that.

Your Turn!

Okay, your turn! Let me know of your grandest, most outrageous (but potentially accomplishable) goal via the comments below. Put it out there, make it that much more tangible. Let’s see the legendary company we all keep by being part of this online community.

Major Hat Tip to Niall over at Disrupting the Rabblement for the idea and inspiration for this post.