When did I become so boring?

Feels like you're just kind of sleepwalking through your life.

You're going through the motions.

You're kind of on autopilot.

Based on the research, simply putting a plan in place to explore your own backyard will bring more excitement into your day-to-day life.

Just making the list.

If you live in a city, instead of walking the same route to work, take a new one.

Instead of going the same way to your workout class or grocery store, even to your friend's house, take a detour.

Changing things up, shaking things up is an essential requirement to experiencing joy and happiness in your life.

Setting goals is critical to creating a better life.

Making a goal and doing it, it does two important things.

First of all, a goal of something you're going to do gives you a sense of direction.

And second, it defines a...

If I could just snap my fingers and put us both on a beach in Bali, like boom.

There we are laying on the sand.

Oh my God.

Wouldn't that be amazing?

Of course it would be amazing, but let's be honest.

We don't have the time to just leave our life behind right now, jump on a plane and go halfway around the world.

So here's what we're going to do instead.

I'm going to teach you my favorite trick to shaking up your life.

It's a little game and I play this game all the time.

It is exactly what you need right now.

And what I love about it doesn't have to cost a thing.

It is right in front of your face, just waiting for you to see it.

All you need is 30 minutes and the willingness to walk out your front door and the game begins.

So you're ready?

Great.

Let's shake things up.

There's a couple of reasons why I love this game.

Number one, it is a simple way to shake up your life.

I mean, let's, let's face it.

You are a creature of habit.

So am I.

And it doesn't matter if you're in a small town, you live in a rural area, you live in a big city, there are places right around you where you've never eaten.

There are coffee shops you've never stepped foot inside of.

There are neighborhoods that you've never explored.

Museums, art galleries, junk shops, antique stores, secondhand clothing places that you've never opened the door and stepped foot inside.

There are lectures that are happening right now at your local library that you aren't even aware of, sports leagues that you could join, volunteer opportunities that you've always wanted to get involved in.

There are hiking trails, biking trails, walking trails that you've always passed by, but you've never turned and ventured down, you know, I'm right.

And the second reason why I love this game, never been there, never done that, is because you shouldn't have to wait until you have the time and the money to go on a vacation far away.

You shouldn't have to wait to be able to escape your day-to-day life.

You know, I was just talking with my colleague, Tracy, who is the executive producer of this podcast, and she was sharing this story that I know is going to resonate with you.

So this weekend she was with her family and everyone was gathering around and they were talking about all of these possible places that they could go away on vacation together.

Let's go to the Caribbean.

How about Patagonia?

Wouldn't it be fun to go on safari?

I've always wanted to go to Greece.

You've done that with your family, right?

I mean, it's really fun.

It's amazing to put together a big wishlist, but it's going to take you two years to save the money and block everybody's calendars.

I mean, if you're anything like my family or Tracy's family, there's one weekend this summer that your family can actually find overlapping dates to be able to get to the same beach together.

And so planning a big, amazing trip to the Caribbean or to go on safari or go somewhere you've never been before, having something like that off in the distance, it is so important and you should do that.

But here's the thing.

It's often the distance.

I mean, Tracy and I were just laughing because you want to know what happened with her family at the end of this amazing dream vacation brainstorming session?

They had a fun time brainstorming, but there was no vacation planned.

Why?

Well, because there's not a single date this year that works for anybody.

And if you really take a second and you stop and think about your own life, modern life is really busy.

I mean, what if I told you that you could do something that is almost as fun as going away on vacation in the next seven days, you could create your own adventure playing this game, never been there, never done that.

And so that's what we're going to do.

And by the end of this podcast, you are going to have generated your own bucket list of things to do and experience in your own backyard.

And the way that I'm going to teach you how to do this is I will walk you through five different prompts that are going to make you really think about all the different ways that you can explore your own neighborhood or your own city or the varying towns around you.

And you are going to make a never been there, never done that list.

You don't have to do it one day.

Whatever ends up on the never been there, never done that list.

This is something you can pick from once a week from now until the end of the year to keep shaking up your life.

Because the research shows when you have something in the future to look forward to, what's so cool about that is you get two bumps to your mood and your energy.

The first boost that you get to your mood and your energy is simply planning it.

Planning it and having something that you're able to look forward to, boom, immediately it boosts your mood and energy, which is what we're going to do right now.

Together on the podcast as friends, we are going to plan your never been there, never done that list.

And the second time you're going to get a big boost to your energy and your mood is when you actually do the thing on your never been there, never done that list.

When you go to a place you've never been to, when you do the thing that you've never done, you are going to feel like a different person.

I do this all the time.

Trust me, you are going to see.

And so I want you to start this process by just thinking about where you live.

Okay.

Maybe you live in a rural area like I do, and you constantly say to yourself, there's nothing to do around here.

Or maybe you live in the suburbs and it's like boring.

You basically go to like those big shopping areas where the big box stores are.

You, you know, do the same things.

Or maybe you live in a big city, but you really only stick to your neighborhood in the big city, wherever it is that you live in the world.

There is so much under your nose just waiting to be discovered.

I once heard somebody described the area that I live in very, very rural area on the outside.

It looks like there isn't squat to do where I live.

But what this person said is she's like, you know, it's very deceiving.

You know, you look around, you don't see anything.

It's sort of like walking by an anthill, right?

You literally see an anthill and you're like, that's a little mound of dirt.

Nothing interesting going on there.

Not true.

You look inside an anthill.

Holy cow.

There's a whole world and vibrancy.

Same thing about your own backyard.

See, the problem is that you drive by the same things.

You do the same stuff and you are missing what is hidden underneath the surface.

Something that is waiting for you to unlock all the hidden gems to discover in your own backyard.

And if you think about your life experience, I bet you know that this is true.

So I'm going to tell you a story to just prove my point.

You know, I remember when I moved from the Boston area where my husband and I had lived with our three kids for 26 years up to a rural area in southern Vermont.

It wasn't until I left the Boston area that I realized I didn't take advantage of absolutely everything that the greater Boston area had to offer.

I didn't explore it.

I didn't care about it.

I mean, I went to the same three restaurants.

I went to the same coffee shop.

I almost never went to Fenway Park.

I bet I went to the MFA, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston once or twice in 26 years. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, you know, the one where there was that huge art heist, maybe once or twice.

I never even made it out to the Harbor Islands for the day.

I mean, I could go on and on and on and come to think of it.

You know, we moved to this area in southern Vermont, the place that I now live for 28 years. But let me paint a picture for how little I actually knew about the area.

We would drive up there occasionally to go visit my in-laws.

We would arrive Friday night after work.

We'd put the kids to bed.

We would wake up at their house.

We would have breakfast at the house with the family, and then we would either go hike or Chris would play golf or we would go to one or the two ski resorts that are in the area. And then we would come back.

We'd have dinner at the house with family.

And then we would drive back to Boston on Sunday morning.

So for all those years, when we would go up to Vermont for a weekend, this was our routine. We never went out to eat other than running to a grocery store.

We never really went shopping or did anything.

So when our son turned to us four years ago and said, I want to move to southern

Vermont, I turned to him and I was like, southern Vermont.

What? There's nothing.

I mean, that is a place where people go to die.

There's nothing to do there.

I'm not moving there.

And I couldn't have been more wrong.

It's just like my new friend said.

Any place that you live has a vibrant, active community like an anthill.

So much going on.

You're just passing by.

You don't see what's beneath the surface.

In fact, right near where I live is the National Fly Fishing History Museum.

28 years I've been driving past this place.

Never stepped foot in there.

So guess what?

It's going on the list.

It's something I could do this weekend.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

I mean, my colleague Jesse is always raving about this amazing garden center.

She says it just goes on for miles and miles.

And it is so incredible.

I'd never even heard of it.

Never been there. Never done that.

I'm going to add it to the list.

There's also this place where there's this cross-country ski complex where they light the trails with candles.

I mean, how freaking cool is that?

Never been there. Never done it.

Add it to the list.

Here's another one.

And in fact, this is what I love about this game.

You are so into your routine of going to the same three restaurants.

You haven't even been looking around at all the cool things.

And once you start to open your mind to this, you're going to see it everywhere.

Just like I'm seeing it everywhere.

There are all these women that I now know, since I've lived in Southern

Vermont for four years, who all go to the same CrossFit gym.

Never been there.

Never done that.

Adding it to the list.

And here's another one.

I've just heard that there's a new woman who teaches a bar class on Tuesday nights. She's supposed to be fantastic.

She moved to the area.

Never even been to the studio she's teaching.

I didn't even know it was there.

So are you starting to get a sense of what a fun game this is?

Good.

Because starting right now, you and me, we are starting our never been there, never done it adventure together.

Now I've already added five things to my list.

And so we're going to keep on having some fun.

And we're going to start adding things to your list because the whole point is for you to shake things up, to become more connected, more adventurous, to live a more purposeful life, to explore a little, to shake things up and have a whole lot more fun.

And if you've opened up every door in your teeny tiny little town, just go one town over or go one neighborhood over or one city block over, and you're going to find a whole new world to explore.

Before we talk about these five different types of things you're going to add to the list, let's just dig into the science because there's great science to explain.

Why this never been there, never done that adventure game thing is so awesome.

And the two areas of research that explain the power of the never been there, never done it list have to do with goal setting and something called habituation.

And I'm going to take them one at a time.

So the first body of research that I want to talk about is goals.

Based on the research, setting goals is critical to creating a better life because dreams and goals, even when they're just as simple as like, you know what I'm going to do this weekend, I'm going to go down to that new garden center, things that you can do in your own backyard, making a goal and doing it, it does two important things.