If there’s one blessing I’m sure to double-count every day, it’s that I’ll never have to be 16 again. At 16, I was grotesque and infinitely vulnerable – a human pimple just on the verge of popping. And while I’m no great sage now, I’d like to imagine that if I had 15 minutes to smack a little sense into my several-years-ago self, it’d go a little like this:
Apologies and thank-yous are cheap; accusations wind up being very, very expensive. Keep yourself in the black. This advice works on the big scale (saving relationships, getting out of tough legal spots) and the small (overdraft fees, anyone?). And it applies doublewhen it comes to spreading rumors about your best friend’s prom date. Ouch, dude.
Potential without hard work is more than just foolish. It’s tragic.Do you know how many people there are out there with first-class, platinum talents who haven’t worked a single day in their lives? Of course you don’t. No one’s ever heard of them.
Other people’s delusions of grandeur don’t hurt you, so just let them be. Which ties in to the only universal truth I’ve ever stumbled upon: do NOT get in a fight on the internet. It will not be worth it.
You know that dream – the one so big inside you that you can’t even utter its name? Can the fear and start going for it now. You’ll die if you don’t. Or at the very least, have only made a very low bid for immortality.
Your parents love you more than you can imagine. God only knows why. But you can’t spell “masochism” without “M O M,” and thank goodness for that.
Of course, sixteen-year-old me is such a punk that she wouldn’t listen to a word of this advice. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
What words of hard-earned wisdom would you pass on to your own dumb, wonderful selves if you could go back in time?
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