The five greatest moments of your life...

[cute fuzzy bunny]

...as part of ones inevitable examination of their life, I've found this question to be an interesting one.

Like most people, the first couple are pretty easy. The birth of my son, and my marriage (because my wife said it was). After that it gets pretty interesting sorting through which really were the best moments of your life.

So while I'm pondering which will round out my list, what were the best five moments of your life? No hardass definitions...a moment, an hour, a day, a month. Greatness is up to your perspective.

What experiences will you look back on some day as having been your finest?

This is something I've been pondering for months. Seems like every day another event or moment pops into my head that seems to deserve top 5 billing...

[Nords]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cute fuzzy bunny What experiences will you look back on some day as having been your finest?

As you've said, my spouse helped with the top three:
1. Marriage
2. Birth of our daughter
3. ER
4. Entering the Naval Academy (not necessarily my finest but very intense)
5. Leaving the Naval Academy!

Although there was that time off the coast of... never mind.

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Wow, that was quick. I'm still noodling over moments of success, surviving through failures, times when my character was tested.

[W2R]

OK, I'll bite. It's hard to know which five are the best. Though there were many memorable activities, like diving off Makua back in the day, we need events or moments. Here are five that were at least pretty good:

1.) Not our wedding (it was awful!) but ESCAPING with him after the reception.

2.) Holding my baby girl for the first time

3.) E.E. senior project presentation

4.) Ph.D. dissertation defense

5.) Buying my house, and eventually getting it paid off!

And sorry to say, since this will disappoint the sentamentalists - - #4 was by far the top event listed. No doubt about it.

[Khan]

Age 17: Graduating highschool and getting to leave home/small town

Age 21: Graduating college

Age 23: Leaving New Jersey for California

Age 26: Getting married

Age 54: Retiring

[Sam]

- Falling in love the first time at age 15. In retrospect, this could also be the worst moment in life. One way love is wonderful and painful at the same time.

- Arrive safely at a refugee camp in Malaysia

- First college day, 6 months after arriving in the US

- Birth of daughter and son

- First positive networth after 13 years in the US

[CyclingInvestor]

age 20 - Graduating college, moving to LA, starting work in 3 days
age 27 - Completing first long solo bike ride (Portland,OR to Los Angeles)
age 27 - Getting married
age 34 - Getting divorced
age 48 - Retirement

[Outtahere]

The birthday my mother bought me my horse.

Graduating from college - I was the first in my family to graduate and to date still the only one with a degree.

Buying my home- back in the early 80's it was damned near impossible for a single woman to purchase a house. The bank put me through hell but finally had to give me the loan.

Putting up all I owned and worked for to buy into this company and then 4 years later paying off the mortage and the business loan associated with the purchase to be debt free. (I know it's a long moment but it seemed like it happened in a flash)

I don't have a 5th one yet, heck my life's only half over. I suppose I could say the day dh and I got married but that was just another day to us.

[Moemg]

It was hard to narrow it down to five .I need at least five hundred .What's interesting none of mine have to do with money and most of them have to do with my children.Call me a sentimental fool but there is nothing greater than watching your children suceed .

[FinanceDude]

Do they have to be happy moments, or can they be sad? I think either can have a profound impact on someone..........

[grumpy]

1. The first time I saw my wife - love at first sight

2. Birth of son

3. Birth of daughter

4. Seeing son win a gold, three silver and a bronze medal in swimming at the 1997 World Maccabiah Games in Israel

5. My retirement party

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Up to you. The exercise for me was trying to figure out what in my life were the defining moments, the last five things I'd want to remember at the end of my life, the five things I'll tell my son about when he's old enough to be philosophical.

Interesting exercise. I came up with five but cant stop thinking about it and i'm not sure they're my final five.

But the definition of "greatness" clearly is the tough part, and I keep changing my mind about it.

[lazygood4nothinbum]

good question. i’m not normally organized enough to itemize life.

within the top five i’d have a number of items in my meditation and dream yoga columns but as they would just sound ridiculous on paper and few would relate i won’t list those here.

in the so-called real world my first great accomplishment was at summer camp. i could hardly throw, never mind hit. the short stop razzed me enough to piss me off. i caught the pitch solid and hit that ball so hard right into this guy’s face that all he could do was fall to the dirt. he never made fun of me again. i learned to focus & win through anger. thus developed a successful competitor.

my second great feat was later realizing that winning doesn’t matter. this occurred during a monopoly game which, when i won, i noticed how the three losers had each other while i had no one to enjoy my win. i learned to put up a good game but—at least often enough--to let my friends win. they loved to beat me and it made me smile to see them happy. i learned to lose and to let go of anger.

my third greatest moment was the second i met my partner; it was love at first laugh. our mothers had tried to get us to meet for years. we avoided it. on the fated day by a series of events we found ourselves together. his mom had me go out to their boat to introduce myself. my new found love was on his way up to the flybridge. i said something; he cracked up. he said something; i cracked up. becoming such fast friends, we only stopped laughing at his funeral where i’m pretty sure i cracked a few jokes between the tears. but i have no idea who got the last laugh.

my fourth greatest moment was becoming friends with my brother after 40 years of fighting. that he wouldn’t befriend me hurt for most of my life. it took a failed marriage to knock a chip off his shoulder. and then his second very good marriage and three wonderful children to teach him how to relate well to others. his youngest (the cutest) is my twin. in learning how to deal with the little one’s sensitivities, my brother learned how to understand me. so when we needed to assume administration of mom’s life as co-guardians, my brother and i became friends. we have not had a single fight in five years and i finally have the brother i always wanted.

my fifth greatest moment unfolds just now. i thought for sure i would become a basketcase when mom died. i stopped meditation and dream yoga so that i would not escape & go over the edge--so that i would be able to concentrate on contolling my emotions. i have lost the most amazing loves of my life and yet i have been able to keep myself stable and relatively happy. when you can lose your partner & then your ol’ man & your best friend & then your loved pet & then bury your most beloved mother all within a few years of each other and still smile and laugh and plan for better times ahead, you know you are doing ok.

arriving at the realization that regardless of what life throws our way, it is we who determine how we experience what we experience has been one of the greatest moments i’ve ever known.

[Webzter]

Top five defining moments so far:

0. Will be married 7 years this January. I'm happier with her now than when we first met.

1. "We need you to come back for an x-ray, we spotted a dark spot on your lung."

2. "We need you to take a CT scan, it's a spot but we need more tests."

3. "Well, the CT scan shows that it's not on your lung, it's a growth on the inside wall of your back ribs. The good news it, I'm 90% sure that it's benign. But, if we need to take it out, we'll to in through your front wall, deflate a lung and remove the two ribs plus part of the surrounding ones. Get another scan in 6 months"

4. "Great news, the next CT scan showed no increase in growth. You don't need to come back for a year"

With no kids yet, and only being 29, the next things to compare against would be:

- My dad retiring from the air force to move us back to be near my grandpa in his final years (cancer). The three of us went on 3 hour walks every morning.

- Seeing my first magazine article published

- Seeing my name on Amazon when my first book was published

- Having people come up and tell me how much they enjoyed and learned from the books I helped write.

- Realizing finally that it's easier to be a saver than a consumer.

[CyclingInvestor]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FinanceDude Do they have to be happy moments, or can they be sad? I think either can have a profound impact on someone..........

I listed my divorce as one of the top five. It was sad, and very tough on me at
one level, but it was a correction of what had turned out to be a mistake. It
allowed me to re-become close friends with my ex. The stresses of being married
had placed a real strain on that friendship.

[kcowan]

1. Being assigned to France with the air force
2. Getting my Masters Degree and having the thesis published
3. Getting married
4. Birth of first son (of 2 carrying on the family name of 3 generations)
5. First (of 2) CEO jobs

Tough choices!

[CuppaJoe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Want2retire 4.) Ph.D. dissertation defense

Hi, I'm still new here; what was your topic?

[Sheryl]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cute fuzzy bunny Interesting exercise. I came up with five but cant stop thinking about it and i'm not sure they're my final five. But the definition of "greatness" clearly is the tough part, and I keep changing my mind about it.

CFB - come on - post yours!

This is a good question. I hope I have time to mull it over more. I know two are the day I graduated from architecture school and my first date with my current SO. I'll have to ruminate on the other three.

[CuppaJoe]

A small recent moment after some months of dropping three inter-related relationships due to incompatibility. An old colleague brought in a small deal; after her client left, we hugged, caught up and laughed and laughed. I think of that often to remind myself to "accentuate the positive."

[Bigritchie]

This may sound strange, but I think one of the greatest moments of my life was when I almost died in a very bad military wreck. I broke my back in several places and utterly splattered my spleen and some of my insides, and was told I was going to die.

I was awake and alert during the entire thing, and it was the most utterly peaceful moment of my life. Even when they told me I was going to die, I just cannot even explain the feelings of peace that came over me.

It was a real stepping stone for my life, made me realize life was short (and I better retire even faster!), and 100% took away any fear of death (Now don't get me wrong, I do not wanna die a horrible painful death, but death itself has no fear for me).

I am not a depressed or suicidal person at all, but many times I have felt sad that I did not cross over then, and go into that utter peace.

This probably does not make much sense, but I really cannot even explain the feeling with words.

The other event that comes to mind was laying my eyes on my wife when I was 11 years old, falling utterly in love, and knowing without a doubt I would spend the rest of my life with her.