Someone on Reddit asked a simple question this week. What’s a 10/10 life experience everyone should have at least once?
Hundreds of people answered. Some went for the obvious, like travel and roller coasters. Some got weird. But the answers that rose to the top had something in common. Almost none of them cost much money, and most of them involved feeling very small or very loved.
Being loved back
The top answer wasn’t a place or a thrill. It was falling in love with someone who genuinely loves you back. Close behind it was simply having a spouse who loves you.
Parents piled on next. One said the moment that nothing has topped was hearing their daughter say “I love you” for the first time. Another said having a kid makes everything you thought was important fade away.
And then the kids debate started
This is Reddit, so of course it turned into a fight. For every parent calling it life changing, someone fired back that they got a vasectomy early and have zero regrets. One person called the pressure to marry and have kids dumb. Another noticed what they called a weird anti-kid wave showing up in threads lately, even where it doesn’t belong.
Nobody changed anyone’s mind. Nobody ever does.
The sailors stole the thread
The most upvoted story came from a veteran who spent 20 years in the Navy, mostly on ships in the Atlantic. Navy ships run completely dark at night. Sailors weren’t supposed to hang out on deck after dark, but they did anyway. He said nothing compares to a clear, moonless night at sea with no lights anywhere. He described one night he’ll never forget, with a cold full moon, heavy seas, and fog hugging the water.
A retired sailor with 25 years at sea jumped in. He described looking up at the galaxy from the back of the ship in the middle of the Pacific, then looking down at glowing algae swirling in the wake. He said it kept him sane through eight deployments, and that it made him feel “beautifully insignificant.”
A submarine veteran topped them both. He once watched whales and other sea life surround his submarine, seen through the periscope while submerged.
Nature that video can’t capture
The rest of the outdoor answers read like a bucket list:
- A total solar eclipse. Several people named this separately, without seeing each other’s answers.
- The northern lights, ideally up close.
- Live lava. One person said film doesn’t come close to seeing a volcano erupt in person.
- Swimming with manta rays, described as otherworldly.
- The Grand Canyon. One Arizona native finally went at 28 and cried. Someone else replied they were underwhelmed after a minute. Reddit gonna Reddit.
- The Sequoias, Yosemite, and the Scottish Highlands, with one person adding the key instruction: slowly.
Places you don’t leave the same
One person said visiting the Normandy beaches and the American cemetery changed them. The coastline is beautiful and peaceful, which makes the scale of what happened there hit harder. They said you can’t walk it and leave as the same person. Another reader said Gettysburg did the same thing for them.
The most moving reply came from someone whose great-grandfather’s brother, a World War I soldier, was identified through DNA about 15 years ago and reburied in a new Allied cemetery. They went to spread soil from his family farm over the headstone. A tour guide saw what they were doing, took their hand, and gave them an unplanned tour of the surrounding battlefields while the rest of the group followed along in silence.
Go far, and stay a while
Travel came up more than almost anything, with a specific rule attached. One commenter said to skip the long weekend and fly at least eight hours to another country, stay a week or more, eat what locals eat, and talk to people. Others said living abroad for a stretch, getting a little lost somewhere new, or watching the sunrise in a place you’ve never been.
The adrenaline crowd
- Skydiving. A skydiver’s advice: if it scares you, that’s the sign to go.
- Riding a motorcycle down a winding road and nailing every corner.
- Leading a pack of cyclists at 30 mph. One rider said with a group drafting behind you, it feels like driving a runaway freight train.
- A concert at Red Rocks in Colorado, or your favorite artist from a close seat.
- Being at the championship game when the home team wins.
The small ones might be the best ones
Some of the best answers didn’t need a plane ticket.
- Caring for an animal, and being an animal’s favorite person.
- Homemade fried chicken with all the fixings.
- Learning one song well on any instrument, or playing music with other people.
- A full day without any technology.
- Successfully performing CPR.
- Doing the thing you loved as a kid with your own kids, once they’re old enough to love it too.
And the one that might be hardest of all: being completely content with what you have, where you are, for at least one full day. As the commenter put it, it sounds easy.
One person admitted they’d never been to Disneyland as a kid because their parents hated crowds. They finally went at 32 and called it one of the best days of their life. Fifteen straight hours of fun.
So what’s yours?
The pattern across hundreds of answers was hard to miss. The experiences people treasure most are rarely the expensive ones. They’re the moments that make you feel tiny next to something huge, or completely loved by someone close.
