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I am 28 now. I don’t think about the past or regret things much these days.
But sometimes I wish that I had known some of things I have learned over the last few years a bit earlier. That perhaps there had been a self-improvement class in school. And in some ways there probably was.
Because some of these 16 things in this article a teacher probably spoke about in class. But I forgot about them or didn’t pay attention.
Some of it would probably not have stuck in my mind anyway. Or just been too far outside my reality at the time for me to accept and use.
But I still think that taking a few hours from all those German language classes and use them for some personal development classes would have been a good idea. Perhaps for just an hour a week in high school. It would probably be useful for many students and on a larger scale quite helpful for society in general.
So here are 16 things I wish they had taught me in school (or I just would like to have known about earlier).
1. The 80/20 rule.
This is one of the best ways to make better use of your time. The 80/20 rule – also known as The Pareto Principle – basically says that 80 percent of the value you will receive will come from 20 percent of your activities.
So a lot of what you do is probably not as useful or even necessary to do as you may think.
You can just drop – or vastly decrease the time you spend on – a whole bunch of things.
And if you do that you will have more time and energy to spend on those things that really brings your value, happiness, fulfilment and so on.
2. Parkinson’s Law.
You can do things quicker than you think. This law says that a task will expand in time and seeming complexity depending on the time you set aside for it. For instance, if you say to yourself that you’ll come up with a solution within a week then the problem will seem to grow more difficult and you’ll spend more and more time trying to come up with a solution.
So focus your time on finding solutions. Then just give yourself an hour (instead of the whole day) or the day (instead of the whole week) to solve the problem. This will force your mind to focus on solutions and action.
The result may not be exactly as perfect as if you had spent a week on the task, but as mentioned in the previous point, 80 percent of the value will come from 20 percent of the activities anyway. Or you may wind up with a better result because you haven’t overcomplicated or overpolished things. This will help you to get things done faster, to improve your ability to focus and give you more free time where you can totally focus on what’s in front of you instead of having some looming task creating stress in the back of your mind.
3. Batching.
Boring or routine tasks can create a lot of procrastination and low-level anxiety. One good way to get these things done quickly is to batch them. This means that you do them all in row. You will be able to do them quicker because there is less “start-up time” compared to if you spread them out. And when you are batching you become fully engaged in the tasks and more focused.
A batch of things to do in an hour today may look like this: Clean your desk / answer today’s emails / do the dishes / make three calls / write a grocery shopping list for tomorrow.
4. First, give value. Then, get value. Not the other way around.
This is a bit of a counter-intuitive thing. There is often an idea that someone should give us something or do something for us before we give back. The problem is just that a lot of people think that way. And so far less than possible is given either way.
If you want to increase the value you receive (money, love, kindness, opportunities etc.) you have to increase the value you give. Because over time you pretty much get what you give. It would perhaps be nice to get something for nothing. But that seldom happens.
5. Be proactive. Not reactive.
This one ties into the last point. If everyone is reactive then very little will get done. You could sit and wait and hope for someone else to do something. And that happens pretty often, but it can take a lot of time before it happens.
A more useful and beneficial way is to be proactive, to simply be the one to take the first practical action and get the ball rolling. This not only saves you a lot of waiting, but is also more pleasurable since you feel like you have the power over your life. Instead of feeling like you are run by a bunch of random outside forces.
6. Mistakes and failures are good.
When you are young you just try things and fail until you learn. As you grow a bit older, you learn from - for example - school to not make mistakes. And you try less and less things.
This may cause you to stop being proactive and to fall into a habit of being reactive, of waiting for someone else to do something. I mean, what if you actually tried something and failed? Perhaps people would laugh at you?
Perhaps they would. But when you experience that you soon realize that it is seldom the end of the world. And a lot of the time people don’t care that much. They have their own challenges and lives to worry about.
And success in life often comes from not giving up despite mistakes and failure. It comes from being persistent.
When you first learn to ride your bike you may fall over and over. Bruise a knee and cry a bit. But you get up, brush yourself off and get on the saddle again. And eventually you learn how to ride a bike. If you can just reconnect to your 5 year old self and do things that way - instead of giving up after a try/failure or two as grown-ups often do – you would probably experience a lot more interesting things, learn valuable lessons and have quite a bit more success.
7. Don’t beat yourself up.
Why do people give up after just few mistakes or failures? Well, I think one big reason is because they beat themselves up way too much. But it’s a kinda pointless habit. It only creates additional and unnecessary pain inside you and wastes your precious time. It’s best to try to drop this habit as much as you can.
8. Assume rapport.
Meeting new people is fun. But it can also induce nervousness. We all want to make a good first impression and not get stuck in an awkward conversation.
The best way to do this that I have found so far is to assume rapport. This means that you simply pretend that you are meeting one of your best friends. Then you start the interaction in that frame of mind instead of the nervous one.
This works surprisingly well. You can read more about it in How to Have Less Awkward Conversations: Assuming Rapport.
9. Use your reticular activation system to your advantage.
I learned about the organs and the inner workings of the body in class but nobody told me about the reticular activation system. And that’s a shame, because this is one of the most powerful things you can learn about. What this focus system, this R.A.S, in your mind does is to allow you to see in your surroundings what you focus your thoughts on. It pretty much always helps you to find what you are looking for.
So you really need to focus on what you want, not on what you don’t want. And keep that focus steady.
Setting goals and reviewing them frequently is one way to keep your focus on what’s important and to help you take action that will move your closer to toward where you want to go. Another way is just to use external reminders such as pieces of paper where you can, for instance, write down a few things from this post like “Give value” or “Assume rapport”. And then you can put those pieces of paper on your fridge, bathroom mirror etc.
10. Your attitude changes your reality.
We have all heard that you should keep a positive attitude or perhaps that “you need to change your attitude!”. That is a nice piece of advice I suppose, but without any more reasons to do it is very easy to just brush such suggestions off and continue using your old attitude.
But the thing that I’ve discovered the last few years is that if you change your attitude, you actually change your reality. When you for instance use a positive attitude instead of a negative one you start to see things and viewpoints that were invisible to you before. You may think to yourself “why haven’t I thought about things this way before?”.
When you change you attitude you change what you focus on. And all things in your world can now be seen in a different light.
This is of course very similar to the previous tip but I wanted to give this one some space. Because changing your attitude can create an insane change in your world. It might not look like it if you just think about it though. Pessimism might seem like realism. But that is mostly because your R.A.S is tuned into seeing all the negative things you want to see. And that makes you “right” a lot of the time. And perhaps that is what you want. On the other hand, there are more fun things than being right all the time.
If you try changing your attitude for real – instead of analysing such a concept in your mind - you’ll be surprised.
You may want to read more about this topic in Take the Positivity Challenge!
11. Gratitude is a simple way to make yourself feel happy.
Sure, I was probably told that I should be grateful. Perhaps because it was the right thing to do or just something I should do. But if someone had said that feeling grateful about things for minute or two is a great way to turn a negative mood into a happy one I would probably have practised gratitude more. It is also a good tool for keeping your attitude up and focusing on the right things. And to make other people happy. Which tends to make you even happier, since emotions are contagious.
12. Don’t compare yourself to others.
The ego wants to compare. It wants to find reasons for you to feel good about yourself (“I’ve got a new bike!”). But by doing that it also becomes very hard to not compare yourself to others who have more than you (“Oh no, Bill has bought an even nicer bike!”). And so you don’t feel so good about yourself once again. If you compare yourself to others you let the world around control how you feel about yourself. It always becomes a rollercoaster of emotions.
A more useful way is to compare yourself to yourself. To look at how far you have come, what you have accomplished and how you have grown. It may not sound like that much fun but in the long run it brings a lot more inner stillness, personal power and positive feelings.
13. 80-90% of what you fear will happen never really come into reality.
This is a big one. Most things you fear will happen never happen. They are just monsters in your own mind. And if they happen then they will most often not be as painful or bad as you expected. Worrying is most often just a waste of time.
This is of course easy to say. But if you remind yourself of how little of what you feared throughout your life that has actually happened you can start to release more and more of that worry from your thoughts.
14. Don’t take things too seriously.
It’s very easy to get wrapped up in things. But most of the things you worry about never come into reality. And what may seem like a big problem right now you may not even remember in three years.
Taking yourself, your thoughts and your emotions too seriously often just seems to lead to more unnecessary suffering. So relax a little more and lighten up a bit. It can do wonders for your mood and as an extension of that; your life.
15. Write everything down.
If your memory is anything like mine then it’s like a leaking bucket. Many of your good or great ideas may be lost forever if you don’t make a habit of writing things down. This is also a good way to keep your focus on what you want. Read more about it in Why You Should Write Things Down.
16. There are opportunities in just about every experience.
In pretty much any experience there are always things that you can learn from it and things within the experience that can help you to grow. Negative experiences, mistakes and failure can sometimes be even better than a success because it teaches you something totally new, something that another success could never teach you.
Whenever you have a “negative experience” ask yourself: where is the opportunity in this? What is good about this situation? One negative experience can – with time – help you create many very positive experiences.
What do you wish someone had told you in school or you had just learned earlier in life?
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Excellent Summary! I am 28 too and I agree with you in that those are some of things I think are really worth learning young. Its really difficult to because of oversimplification sometimes.. the 80-20 rule for example, or Parkinson’s Law don’t make as much sense until you actually experience them for yourself, but then, its helpful to learn that early. Its a result driven world, and I have moved from using the 80-20 to my full advantage (upto high school) to using ignoring it completely (seeking perfection– not sure it was easy to achieve) to trying to go back to 80-20 again. I found your article today, and it nicely summed up so much of what I have had in mind for a while, and a bit more
.
Excellent job, keep it up!
Prajjwal
Thank you very much, Prajjwal. I’m glad that the article resonated so well with you. You are right, things like Parkinson’s Law is something you have get experience with to understand. Just like quite a few of the things on this list, since many of them might seem strange or totally counter-intuitive to the mind.
I thought this was a very good article! One thing I wish I had known when I was younger - I’m 40 now - was to be kinder to myself. I think you touch on that in 12 and 14, but I was so critical of myself - especially my physical appearance, and now I look back and think of the time and energy wasted on something that wasn’t true. Everyone really is beautiful and I wish more people could know it about themselves and forget about plastic surgery and eating disorders etc. Great article though, thanks!
It’s been extremely long since I last saw a productivity article on the internet with any valuable content. Your article has more than just some value; it’s all excellent stuff! Applause!
#10
Do you know how complicated the concept of attitude is? Take a look at the Wikipedia article.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attitude_%28psychology%29
Henrik,
I’d add
17) Accept what you are and work to improve your characteristics rather than change it.
18) Read the 15th item again!
Cheers
Lucio Ribeiro
I work at a tech startup, and one of my coworkers has a favorite saying: “All engineering problems eventually come down to heat.”
In general, most fields will have a reasonably specific problem which is the cause of any trouble you have 90% of the time. So if you’re having a problem and you’re not sure why, think of that one first.
Also, item 15 is probably the best advice to give anyone, ever. Not because it’s the most important, but because it’s extremely important and people hardly ever mention it.
Fantastically comprehensive list of life lessons.
For the philosophically minded - I humbly submit the following lesson: Only preach to the converted.
When I found out about the hidden world of government malfeasance and financial cabals that are responsible for so much misery in this world, and that exist with the help of the media’s complicity, I naturally assumed a lot of people would want to know.I spent all sorts of time and emotional energy on my soapbox, to be met with bored stares or snide remarks. The only time such speech-making and arguing was productive was when I had found someone already inclined to my way of thinking who was looking for answers, as I was.
So Liberals, stop trying to convert Conservatives, and vice versa. Veggies, leave those BBQ eaters alone. If you want to change the world, start with yourself so as to provide an example, and then only preach to people who ask for a sermon!
Excellent suggestions. The thing is, that what we call a “university” in the usa today is actually many trade schools pulled together onto the same campus. And yes, a person in her or his early years at college is required to take classes in all the different trades.
The things that you bring up here, are not things which are specific to any trade, and thus they are never taught.
I would love to see a new kind of college education - where perhaps the philosophy department could expand to become the overall auspices of the school. This would be a school for folks who want to learn how to think critically, and reason independently. Woven into the curriculum, there would be training in all the tools a person needs in this modern world, to start her own business. Computer programming, web design, introductory economics and business courses would be important. This would be a school for both thinkers, and for entrepreneurs.
Word…Respect.
Fantastic post! I’ve forwarded it on to a few friends / family members. I’m 27 and this list will be something I return to as I work on dealing with my fears and not beating myself up!
I wish I had taken to heart what I had heard from my parents over and over which is, save as much money as you can. Put something in the “piggy bank” each pay check, even if it’s just a dollar. This may sound dumb but it really is good advise. Don’t blow your cash but save and set goals. Don’t wipe your self out on credit cards and spend your money before you earn it but have patients and pay cash, which falls in line with #12. Anyway, that’s it for starters. Even though this is parental advise, I’m sure they taught this in economics! Thanks, nice post.
Great post. I like the point about batching, once you get going and build up some steam, you’ll finish those things really quickly.
Being only 23, I’ve seen so many of these things. The 80-20 rule has only come up in business with 80% of your profits coming from 20% of your customers. Very informative and comes at a highly influential time for me - I’m just about to graduate college!
Thank you. These are the tips that I exactly need as the end of this semester of college for me approaches.
Great list of useful skills on your list! I’ll add a couple I wish I had been taught in School.
1. To read at a useful rate (not subvocalizing)
2. Maximize my quality of sleep (therefore minimize sleep time)
Excellent list.
I would just like to add one more(which is probably covered by above list)
“Just like a kid don’t pay too much attention to what others might think about you.” Most of the times we keep worrying about if I do X, what will they think about me. If I do Y, they will think Im crazy. As children we always follow our heart, our dreams. Somehow as adults we are wrapped around conciousness of what will others think, when they have enough problems to worry about themsleves.
Excellent post, thank you.
Very well thought out list - especially #10.
I’ve always followed that philosophy (if you could call it that,) and it really makes life so much more enjoyable. Most people never understand until they really commit to it, and it works so well.
Thanks for the very thought provoking piece, I quite enjoyed it.
16 things, 1 hour each, 1 thing per week and this is really great timetable for self-improvement classes. I wonder if any school would like to add this to their plan.
Great article.
Nicely said. I am 28 and I feel the same. There should’ve been a PD class back in school.
Hey Henrik!
That was one of the finest brief summaries I’ve ever read of the essential things people should know to live a happy, successful life. It’s a credit to you that you found this out in your twenties. I, too, am a devourer of self improvement books, and some that I’ve read didn’t have as much practical information as your one blog post. I especially liked, and believe in, the ones pertaining to having the proper focus and attitude. They’re popular notions in the self help literature, but there’s clearly a reason for that–they’re true!
I have three more that I think of often:
1. My past actions have created the person I am right now, and what I’m doing right now is creating the future me. So, if I’m watching some inane TV show or eating junk food, what kind of future version of me am I creating?
2. A goal without a written plan and a date by which that goal will be accomplished is really no goal at all–only a wish.
3. Two of the worst words in any language are “I know”. Saying these two words, or, more to the point, having the attitude that lies behind those words, can kill all further learning. If you already know it all, then what good is continuing to be receptive to new thoughts?
Thanks
Thanx a ton it was so gud to read this one..
An excellent collection to succeed in life. I doubt whether all these can be taught in school as most of the points discussed are learnt by experience.
Let me add a corollary to #17 offered by Lucio Ribeiro.
17.1: Know your weaknesses and then either work to correct them or surround yourself with people who offset them.
Some weaknesses are things we care about, but we just haven’t had time to address. Others are things that we either are not capable of correcting, or really, really don’t care too. As an entrepreneur, you don’t have to know all aspects of business, technology, finance, marketing, etc, if you surround yourself with the right people.
These are all great lessons, but what I REALLY wish I had learned in school is: Your “permanent record” is a myth that school principals made up to scare you! Breaking the rules can be useful and occasionally necessary.
Awesome article!!! I completely agree with almost everything…that Pessimism is Realism bit really hit home with me…I really want to try and be a more positive person. Also, as you said, don’t compare yourself to others…too often, when we compare ourselves to someone else, it is usually someone that has MORE than we do, not LESS!!! Great article!!
a slightly more practical skill not taught: personal finance. It’s amazing to me you can graduate high school and college without learning how to balance your checkbook and plan your finances. They’ll spend weeks teaching you CPR which you’ll likely never use but no time spent on how to manage your finances which will likely determine how you can provide for yourself and your family.
awesome….thank you
While your list has some valuable life lessons, they really don’t seems like things that would be ‘Taught’ in school.
I think our schools should teach us systems for filing and retrieving information so that we can manage the great deal of information we come across in our lives.
I think schools should spend time to teach ‘Personal Finance’ budgeting, saving, investing, credit use and maintenance. We live in a consumer society and schools do very little to prepare us.
Cooking! Everyone has to eat and many people mess up their finances by spending way to much money eating out. You can eat better and save money if you can cook.
Basic maintenance. How to fix a toilet, how to change your oil, simple troubleshooting for the day to day technical difficulties which we all encounter.
Yours Truly
Jeff Bellamy
http://jeffbellamy
http://123MoneyBasics.com
http://TimeTravelUniversity.com
Too much good stuff to even begin. Brilliant post, thanks!
Good list, but what struck me hardest was the title. It speaks volumes on our society’s expectations for schools, not only to provide “book learning”, but to teach them about life as well. Things like industriousness, attaining goals, maintaining perspective, confidence, and optimism are rightly learned from one’s parents, not the school system. Too bad so many parents fail to teach those important life lessons.
Great list!
However, I’m still 27, so I shall ignore them for another 7 days until I become older…
Daniel
This is one profound post you have written. Thank you for the wisdom, as I can assure you it’s greatly appreciated. All the best, Brad Newman
Excellent work on this list Henrik. I would just like to add something that I think many people forget about batching.
Unless you have someone to do all the routine, mundane activities in your life, you will have to do them yourself. However, instead of doing every activity sequentially, why not stack 2 or 3 items together. Many of these things to do not consume any energy of your conscious mind so you could do other things at the same time. While folding laundry, why not listen to an educational CD or watch a motivational video. While driving, instead of listening to music, learn a language on CD. There are countless examples to make better use of this time. This means you can spend more time doing the things you really want to do or being with the ones you love.
By the way, if you want to really achieve great things in your life you should consider delegating or outsourcing as many of your routine activities as possible. These minimum wage activities are not worth your time. If you are effective in your work, you should be able to make better use of this time and pay or ask someone else, such as an employee or a child, to assist with those activites.
Personal hygiene is probably best taken care of by yourself though;-)
Nice, but the most tipps I consider since I am a small child. So they are so normal for me that I would not talk about them. But .. I see many people who should read your tipps very carefully and start a better and more independent (and successful) life. Although I think it’s a question of your personal addiction if you do it or not.
Some points:
to 1: Yep, you often waste a big part of your time doing unimportant things. A little bit of arrogance often helps.
to 4/5: Right. YOU have to start and not waiting to someone else’s action.
to 6: Absolutely. I am used to make failures just for fun and to be more creative and get an alternative point of view.
to 8: Yep, don’t waste time talking to people you exactly KNOW you won’t stay connected with in future.
to 9: MOST IMPORTANT THING: YOU decide what your focus is. Don’t focus your concentration on things other people focus on.
to 10: VERY important. human beings are sunjective beings.
to 11: Be grateful about your family, your environment, and that you have enough food to stay alive. You see people in foreign country who have just a fraction of material things you have and who are happier than you. Why? They occupy far more intensive with one thing. It makes you happy to know very much about 1 important thing or person. So: Stop buying new electronical gadgets every week. this will not make you happier.
to 12: I don’t know why you talk about it, although I see that many people do the opposite. If I know that I do the right thing I can go so far that I completely ignore what other people do - to get to my target. But sometimes it’s very important to compare - to the right idols - it will motivate you very much!
to 13: in former times fear was useful. today we live very secure - fear is often useless. the stories about terrorism are shit. I think many people NEED fear of sth - fear is part of our emotions to make us stay alive.
to 14: You should not take ANYONE too seriously. Take care about watching good shows like Jackass will show you what it’s about.
to 15: I write down good ideas - this is enough.
Another thing to add: If you have good intentions, never expect other people have them, too. Often they don’t have them and don’t realize it. You should ignore such people.
#1 Use your strengths:
Focus and practice the things you do well. Working on your weaknesses is a myth perpetrated through education systems. While it is relevant to be a generalist at school so that you can find out what your strengths are, from university, college, etc onwards do the things that you can be great at. Good is average, great is possible. No matter how much you train, practice and try, your weaknesses will always be weaker than your strengths. That doesn’t mean that you don’t work on them. There are some things that you really do need to know how to do. Just know that they’re weaknesses and find some way to complement them while spending the majority of your time practicing and contributing with your core strengths.
p.s. great post. Damn well done
Good list, and not one of those general list of obviousness, and not dragged out into enough to fill a cheap book, well written
Another thing I learned was, never let the idiots in class bring you down, and concentrate on learning for yourself
Hallelujah to a great post! Spot on my friend:)
Henrik - Check out The Landmark Forum. Its not offered in Sweden but in Europe the course is available in UK and Netherlands. Teaches you a whole lot about who you are - as a human being.
excellent post, Henrik! Thank you for sharing.
I wish someone had told me that a lot of people will pass through your life. Most of them will be acquaintances, you will pass time and share experiences with them, but they are not truly friends. You will have only a very few true friends in your life, and you should treasure, and keep them close.
Point #12
Thanks for a truly inspiring list of important stuff. The 80-20 rule is also tops on my list.
I offer one of my favorite pieces of personal philosophy which expands on Random Hopper’s comment that “Just like a kid don’t pay too much attention to what others might think about you.”
My advice is “You’ll stop worrying so much about what other people think of you when you realize how seldom they do!”
This goes back to letting go. If you see something you don’t like, don’t let it get you. Don’t think or speak about it, don’t gossip. Don’t spread it. Don’t give it your time. If it crosses your mind, move on, you have let it go.
that was many good edvice =)
hehe.. even thou I new some of them before =)
My first rule is “rise above”. Whatever unpleasant situations you may find, life is more fun if you tell yourself to rise above the ugliness.
My second rule is to try to use the phrase, “I can do that”. Sometimes you can’t realistically say that, but if you can make it your default response, life will be more rewarding.
I remember being 28. At the time, I felt very old. We all had lived a lot in a few short years. I remember thinking about these 16 things. Maybe not broken down in essential parts, but knowing them.
I’m 60 now and learning them still. I have won and lost so many times I can’t count them all. I greet everything with enormous gratitude. I continue to re-invent myself. It’s just in the last few years I have stopped comparing myself and what I have to the accomplishments of others. I love and am loved. Everything else is pure ego.
You only know who is your true friend in times of crisis
Great post, thanks a bunch for sharing !
Great list! Seems that I am guilty of some things you mentioned here. I should focus more for ex. And the 80-20 rule…
To be fair to your teachers and schools, almost all of those sixteen things are the sort of thing you have to learn by experience, nothing else will do. There are a lot of life rules you can sort of understand on an intellectual level if someone tells you about them, but their full import will never be understood until you’ve lived the lessons, yourself. When I sat down to blog about my experiences being homeless and being a high school dropout, I started to realize how few of the things I was saying could be truly understood without having the life experience to put them into context, and I think the same applies to much of this list.
That doesn’t mean these things aren’t worth sharing, though. If even one of those sixteen lessons sinks in and helps one person, then you’ve done a service to your readers. That’s what I hope to accomplish on my blog, as well.
He seems to be right. I remember when I was still back in high school where I really tend to lose my cool most of the time because I was either egoistic or I was just taking things too seriously. I had to learn not taking thing too seriously and not worrying all the time the hard way as I grew older and more mature. Man, those stuff was never taught at school. I had to find it out myself out of getting tired of all of life’s stresses. If somebody had made me realize these things earlier, I could have been happier back then. Well there’s no use in regretting it so just look forward to the future with open arms, whether it’s the one you fear that’s gonna come. ^_^
It’s quite amazing when looking back (I’m 27) all the things you THOUGHT would happen after high school that didn’t. I had a horrible time with bullying in school. Although I knew it was just a school thing and as soon as I got out of there it would be “a lot better” I didn’t think of it as “100% better” as people don’t do constant barrating and name calling like what happens in schools.
Some things I wish were taught in school: I forget the percentages but something like when you are in a class, immediately you are going to forgot half of it. Within a year you’re going to forget 90% of what you learn and/or experience. Basically to focus on what you most cherish from any moment and hope that’s the 10% you still remember.
Nothing is free. Something happened to my train of thought within the past couple years that now whenever I sign up for some service or someone offers me something for free I ask myself “what are they getting from this?” With my brother, for example, always like to give me stuff he no longer uses, which was nice and all. Problem is he never let me forget that. Whenever he wants something in return that cost me money and I don’t want to give up (say copying a game) he starts pulling out “but I gave you …”. When signing up at websites I try to guess what is their motivation. Is it ad revenue? going to charge later on? Now for some people, the “fee” is just knowing so many people use your service and benefit from it. Other’s want to monetize it.
Wow. Great article! I am a grade 8 student, and some of the points here were real eye openers to me. I think i’ll look into the 80/20 rule and Parkinson’s law. Very interesting..
I’m 49 and when I look back at my life I can think a few things for your consideration:
Take a chance. Life’s an adventure and if you risk nothing, your reward will be nothing.
Live your love life to the fullest…ask out the beauty queen but remember that beauty is skin deep, so the just ‘pretty’ girl might be a far more fabulous catch. And, looks can grow on you.
Don’t be a sleaze bag. Sex is a deeply emotional and beautiful experience between two, not dozens.
Have fun.
Keep an upbeat attitude (it bears repeating.)
Enjoy your work or find another job.
Learn how to tell a joke; conversely, learn to listen to and enjoy someone else’s joke. Try to remember several slightly risque ones and even more silly ones.
Strive to see the absurdity in life and laugh at it.
Learn how to compromise.
Learn how to give for the sheer joy of giving.
Tell the truth.
Be punctual.
Help the elderly, for you will be elderly one day too.
Be satisfied with your best efforts.
Be a leader but learn to follow.
Sometimes luck is just persistent hard work. (I stole this one but it’s true).
Well, that’s my .02 good luck in life.
Mike
I found this article through Stumble upon and it appealed to me. I read the whole thing and I’m glad I did. Very nice work. I really enjoyed this.
I am turning 28 on the 29th of this month… #14 was a real eye opener…
I’ve known other points, but 14 is very relevant…
Thanks for sharing this with all of us.
God Bless you.
Peace
good list! learned some new stuff like the reticular activation system. Putting these all into practice will be fun though I’m already applying a good number of them in my life.
Count your blessings! keeps me grounded.
I think the only thing I would add to this very excellent article is the suggestion that your school didn’t teach you this because it was not their job and because to some extent they couldn’t teach it to you. All of the things you listed should have been taught or “caught” in normal everyday life, interactions with others, casual observation, conversation with your parents, etc. My question is why isn’t society passing down these common sense principles to the next generation?
from a nearly 40yo.
Sturgeon’s Law (paraphrased): 90 percent of everything is crap.
Nearing 50 I can see no truer words were ever spoken.
Hey check out my web site with lots of wisdom
www.twofrags.com/hub.php
very good summary. but i wish i learned those 10 years ago
Lots of useful things here!
Wish I could remember who said it, but I’ll quote it anyway:
“As you get older, you realise that an awful lot of things don’t matter. And most things don’t matter at all.”
Reinvent yourself.
You want to be that skydiver who loves to cook? Enroll in a cooking class and head out to the dropzone on Sunday.
Great list. I would add:
Learn to let go. It is natural to want to hold onto people, things, and situations longer than we should because most of us fear change. Change, however, is the one constant in the Universe. By learning to gracefully let go, we’ll be in a better position to welcome new people, things, and situations into our lives.
Great post, I particularly liked Parkinson law - I frequently find myself coming up with the best solutions for problems when time is tight to solve them.
Great post its the attitude that we have that makes the difference and i like your attitude.
I loved most of this and it showed great wisdom. … But… I have a 16 year old son and geting him to work on anything is damn near impossible. I feel like the first one (the 80 / 20 rule_) just confuses the issue. In highschool years some avoid dances, clubs, sports using a blanket response of “too much trouble.” I know you cover not being afraid to fail later, but … # one could be used as an exuse. It’s not always easy to tell whats worth while at the time. Give it a shot. Keep an open mind. The blood and sweat never seems as bad post defacto.
This is great stuff!
I have a serious question for you:
Our high school creates a Student Planner every year. I design the thing and I’m always looking for good information to include.
Would you object to me including a shortened version of your list? I will, of course, give you proper credit and I wish I could pay you, but I don’t even get paid for designing the thing.
Please let me know? Your list could help a bunch of high school kids.
Thank you!
Marla Oxley
French Teacher
Fairfield High School
Fairfield, California
Hi, Marla! Sure, you may include a shortened version of the list in the Student Planner. I hope your students get something useful out of it.
Never limit yourself to your immediate frame of reference. Anything is possible. Approach from an angle that will achieve what you want.
Nothing I learned in grades 2-12, nor my 3-odd years of college, have been of any use to me in 13 years of adult life. Instead of taking the nerd route in Honors Language & Math classes, I should have enrolled in the automotive repair courses - seriously! Personal Finance training is indeed the other HUGE thing lacking.
All you need in life is knowledge of self, knowledge of money, and a passion to pursue as your vocation. The ability to deal with people is priceless.
Save 10% of everything you earn. Over the years it will add up very nicely!
The sooner you start, the more power compound interest will bring to you as the years pass by. The time you start earlier becomes more and more difficult to catch up with. Don’t assume that “when I’m X (say 45) years old, I’ll just put 20K in a savings account in one big move”.
At retirement age, this can mean a difference of hundreds-of-thousands-of-dollars… yes, you read that correctly!
http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2006/05/26/pep-talk-pay-yourself-first/
http://mutualfunds.about.com/cs/mutualfunds101/a/compounding.htm
Let your money work for you basically.
Great article!
I was lucky to come across good books with success principles and meeting some people who practiced and taught these principles when I was 23 years old. Same as you I was upset at first why such important lessons were not taught to me in school. Later on I realized it was not only the schools who are responsible for that but mainly the grown-ups you grow up with, the parents. Parents have the children around for thousands of hours before the first teachers arrive on the scene. It is too easy to lay responsibility for lack of peopleskills/success principles/positive thinking etc. on the educational system. I’m now 50 years old, have successfully used many of the key points you talk about in your post. Also my wife and I have raised our kids in the same spirit, often having to battle with the other influences the kids came across while growing up. During their teen years our “positive influence” seemed to land in very unfertile grounds, when everything a parent says is considered old-fashioned, outdated and dumb. Still I noticed that when they reached their twenties many of the principles had taken root after all, when you hear how they interact with others, solve problems and go about their lives. So the title of your article should maybe read:
16 Things I Wish They Had Taught Me at Home or in School
Thanks for sharing your article with the (future) parents out there.
Here’s one, the trilemma or the art of trade-offs. (I never heard the word trilemma used to describe the principle but I learned it a long time ago and it’s a very useful tool to approach many (any?) projects.
The classic example is managing a project where three major variables are time, cost, quality. Out of the the three you can only really choose two variables, the third one will be ruled out by virtue of the other two being present.
Here’s a discussion of trilemmas:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trilemma
Great article! I’m making a scrapbook for my son for his high school graduation and will include these ideas, along with some of the great additions I’ve read in the comments following.
There’s the other 80/20 rule, of course - 80% of the work will take the first half of the time, and the last 20% will take the other half. I used to underestimate the time I would need for EVERYTHING before I figured that one out.