Welcome to This Curious Adventure!

When I think about this curious adventure we call life, I often find myself thinking how incredible it is that I exist at all.

There is an amazingly improbable series of events that leads to this moment. It starts with the birth of our universe 13.8 billion years ago, which led, through many chance events, to the formation of our solar system out of the remains of generations of forgotten stars. 3.8(?) billion years ago sees the first life on earth, followed by the fits and starts of evolution, punctuated by mass extinctions wiping out just the right creatures at the just the right time, and ending up with the human species as we know it. Innumerable events could have turned out differently and we wouldn’t be here.

Whenever I question what is going on in my life, I always come back to this starting point – we are incredibly lucky just to be here.

Given that we are here, now what? “Why are we here?” is a question that has been pondered for thousands for years. My short answer? Nobody knows. And if nobody knows, the best we can do is come up with our own guess and enjoy as best we can this curious adventure called life.

I’ve spent the last couple of decades working on my best guess, sifting through ideas to find those that helped me figure out who I wanted to be and how to get there.

Once I had kids, I wanted to give them a head start by assembling my best guess and sharing it with them. The idea was that they could use it to get a jump start on what is, as far as we know, a journey with a limited time.

Having shared it with them, I found myself sitting on this material which has been very helpful to me. I thought that there might be people out there who could also use a starter kit for their own guess and suggestions on what to do about it.

That’s the beauty of life. If we are still here, we have a chance to re-think our current guess and improve our lives and the lives of those around us.

How exactly to do that is not always clear, but I have found that a little hard work and the right toolkit can make a significant difference.

If you are someone who has wondered about what to do with this life of yours, or could use some help building your own toolkit, then this book is for you. I hope you find something in here of value.