Wine Makes Everything Taste Better...

It doesn't always take a ton of bricks for you to feel like you were just hit by one. A few days ago I came across video on Facebook that slapped me across the face with a huge wake up call. It was just a remix of a song but something about the music and the visual made me stop and take a mini inventory of my life. And while I am very proud of everything I've accomplished in the past 8 years, I want stories to tell. I want to be able to sit down with my kids and tell them about being humbled when I stood at a temple in India or how I was a kick ass surfer who danced 'til dawn on the playa. I want to find freedom on a mountain top and silence in the ocean before I become a suburban housewife, and after. I was born with magic in my blood and I refuse to give up that potential without fulfilling it. 

In the spirit of learning who I am, I have decided to dedicate the next 2 years to blowing up my boundaries and doing all of the things I only wanted to do in dreams instead of waiting for my 20s to silently expire. While I do have a day job to keep, saving to build and a time limit to consider, I've come up with 30 things for me to do before August 26, 2014--when I turn 30--that are ambitious, international, totally doable AND full of magic. 

So here's my 30 before 30. If anything on here seems like a shock, you probably don't know me outside of the internet. And didn't I say I'm a beautifully strange amalgam of Beyonce, Carrie Bradshaw and Lisa Bonet? Keep that in mind...here'd the list.

1. Go to Burning Man
2. Go Paleo for 30 days
3. Publish my 1st book (OK this is SUPER ambitious and totally doable.)
4. Learn the art of trapeze
5. Go backpacking through Europe
6. Celebrate Durga Puja in Kolkata aka Calcutta
7. Map out my family tree. 
8. Throw a proper dinner party, with food I actually cooked. (I can burn. Lafayette voice)
9. Finish reading those half read books on my shelf.
10. Watch the sunrise over the ocean.
11. Take a good old fashioned American road trip. 
12. Learn how to surf. 
13. Make my apartment beautiful.
14. Spend the weekend with Gabby B at Spirit Junkie summer camp at Kirpalu.
15. Finish a Course in Miracles. 
16. 30 days of getting my yoga on. 
17. Get published in a national glossy. 
18. Go to the shows (not work them) at NYC Fashion Week. 
19. Get my savings on!
20. Add one pair of Louboutins to my closet. 
21. Become fluent in French. 
22. Learn the art of burlesque.
23. Run a marathon....did I mention I don't run at all. 
24. Hike the Appalachian Trail.
25. Go to a music festival that is not Jazz Fest or Voodoo.
26. Bungee jump.
27. Visit the Grand Canyon
28. Give snowboarding a try
29. Learn how to make a stiff martini
30. Follow through. 

I find it fair to mention that I have an intense fear of flying that I intend to conquer during the course of these experiences. That's technically number .1 on the list.