Four of the most powerful words that have stuck with me through the years: Just buy a ticket. One of my favorite pieces of advice I’ve ever received was due to the pure simplicity of the concept. It’s one of those sayings that you hear, and it’s so obvious that when you stop to think about it, you wonder why you don’t follow it a little more regularly.
You want to see the world? Have adventures? Just buy a ticket. The only thing holding you back is you. Sometimes you just have to go for it. You don’t get those amazing experiences by going with the status quo. You just have to take the leap and buy that ticket, whatever it may be. The rest will work itself out.
Concert Tickets
My most recent and best example of buying a ticket was when I happened to discover that Paul McCartney tickets were going on sale two hours from the time I even discovered that the tour was announced.
My mom has been a die-hard Beatles fan ever since she was a young teenager. When they came to the US on their first tour, she had concocted a plan to convince her parents to let her go. However, her older brother caught wind of it and told her parents, ensuring that there would be no trip into the city to catch the concert. She’s never had the opportunity to see the group or any of the members in the proceeding years.
As such, I’ve always wanted to take her to see Paul McCartney, especially as I’ve gotten older. He’s played fairly close a few times over the past several years, but by the time I catch tickets, the prices are exorbitant. This past year, however, I happened to look into tickets two hours before they were about to go on sale.
This is one of those “just go for it” moments. He was playing a show the following summer about 2.5 hours from my mom’s house. That was the closest of the few shows that had been announced. I dutifully sat in the “waiting room” for Ticketmaster, and as soon as the tickets went on sale… I was 2000-something in line. By the time I got into the purchasing area, all but the most expensive floor seats were sold out. I quickly hopped over to StubHub, noted that they were still relatively reasonably priced, and just took the dive – the biggest concert ticket dive of my life. Was it expensive? Sure. Would there be a better time? Probably not. Would my mother have the time of her life? Damn straight. So, it was decided. I bought those tickets, and it was worth every penny.
There will always be reasons why “the time just isn’t right.” However, I’m a big believer that there will never be a “right” time for so many of life’s bigger moments – getting married, having kids – and even some of the smaller ones like booking a flight or getting those concert tickets you’ve always dreamed of. Besides, you’ll likely have the time of your life and make incredible memories along the way.
…But It’s Expensive, I Don’t Have the Time
Trust me, I know. Doing all those things you’ve dreamed about have likely stayed as dreams for one or more valid reasons. It’s expensive, you don’t have the time off work, other commitments have to take priority at the moment. I understand all of those things. I didn’t get to travel in college like I hoped, since I was working just to barely scrape together enough to cover tuition.
Sometimes it may take some time to get there. However, at a certain point, you have to decide what your priorities are. If you want to make it happen, there’s a way.
Once my husband and I graduated college, we knew that travel was going to be a priority in our lives. To us, that means going out to the bars or out for nice dinners wasn’t as high of a priority as saving that money for travel. When friends spent a lot of their time going out on the weekends, we had an easier time passing, knowing that we preferred our spending money to go towards our next trip.
Prioritize your passions, then buy that ticket.
Now that we’re a bit more settled into our careers, my husband and I have been able to do a decent amount of travel in the past few years. From someone with perpetual wanderlust, I still don’t think it’s that much. However, we’ve started to get comments from friends and family about how nice it is that we get to travel so much or how they just couldn’t possibly afford to take the trips that we do. I like to challenge these types of statements. We are able to travel like we do because we prioritize it. We put it into our plan and our budget every year. It doesn’t just happen – we do tons of research to find the best deals (Kayak and Expedia Bundle Deals are two that we’ve used), book early to get better pricing, and plan things in such a way to ensure that we’re getting a great value for our money.
Would you believe me if I told you that we honeymooned in Mauritius, halfway around the world, for just a few hundred dollars more than it would have cost us to honeymoon in the Caribbean?
If you prioritize your passion, build it into your budget and your schedule, it will become easier to make it a reality. Hold yourself accountable to your dreams and passions and find a way to work towards making them a reality. Use a planner, create a planning and budgeting spreadsheet, sign up for newsletters to get the latest on whatever you’re passionate about. It’s the small steps of action that snowball into achievement.
For example, say you want to take a trip next year, and it will cost about $1,500 per person. If you start planning and budgeting ahead of time, that comes out to $125 per month for one year. That may still sound like a lot, but what about $30 per week? Not so bad. Think about how much you spend on coffee in a week, going out for lunch, grabbing a quick happy hour drink, ordering dinner in when you don’t feel like cooking? These are some of the areas that we try to cut back to boost our funds for travel. I understand that not everyone spends money on these types of things, but there are plenty of small steps that can be taken to contribute to your savings.
The Secret
To bring this all back around, whenever I’m starting to feel stuck, I think back to that summer evening, an eager college student ready to get out into the world, and I remember the man that had so many incredible life experiences and those four words he told me: “Just buy a ticket.” That’s the secret.
I find myself in need of the reminder now and again. If it is something that I really want, I have the power to prioritize it and make it happen. Buy the ticket knowing that an investment in myself, my dreams, and my passions, is time and money that is well spent. Perhaps, it is even the best of all ways to invest time and money. Pouring a little more of myself into the things that fill my soul.
Taking the leap to just buy a ticket has brought me so many wonderful experiences, and I’ll always remember that June night, sitting in the stadium in that little Illinois town right on the border with Iowa, watching my mother’s eyes shine with the excitement and anticipation of a lifetime, as Paul McCartney entertained us, serenaded us, and reminded us of the true legend that he is for 3 hours straight.
Maybe this is a little reminder that we could all do with remembering when we start to feel stuck. Go out there and buy your ticket. Whatever it may be.
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