[Serious] What should every young person do?
[Serious] What should every young person do?
For the purpose of this question, the target age range is 20-30. Asking because I feel like I'm wasting my youth.
Floss and make regular dentist visits, prioritize fitness and make it a habit for the rest of your life, and don't allow negative people in your life
Enjoy nature before it gets clearcut for money
Save up an emergency fund. If you can manage to keep six months to a year's worth of expenses in a savings account, it will give you a huge psychological cushion in rough times. Beyond that, save and invest as early as you can.
Learn how to do basic maintenance on a bicycle, car, motorcycle or whatever else in your life that you depend on. That knowledge and experience will pay dividends the rest of your life.
Master your inner dialogue and emotions.
Practice speaking positively and rationally to yourself. Use affirmations, mantras, or visualisations for confidence, for forgiveness of yourself and others, relaxation, motivation.
If you ever feel like crying, it is important to cry hard and deep, and then it's important to recover after with some kind of happy celebration, whether it's playing or a treat, just something nice to help your body learn to get happy after being sad, angry, or scared.
Stop reaching for distractions when powerful emotions come on. Face the emotion. Study it with curiosity. Feel it fully. And comfort yourself positively until it passes.
Start down this road now. You don't want to end up 40, done with school, done with your parents, done with your first couple of real jobs, and have no idea how to control yourself throughout the day.
Travel on the cheap while you're still willing to put up with it.
Seriously. Save up a couple thousand dollars. Go see stuff.
Make sure you have enough in your emergency fund to get home if you screw it up.
Learn a paid skill you can do with your hands. Welding, painting, HVAC, long-line fishing, building PC’s, anything. Get proficient.
You may never use it again. Hopefully you develop a skill-set that pays you better/is less physically demanding/is sexier.
But you will never starve and may be able to feed your family even if your primary occupation falls out of favor.
-- Acquire new skills that will pay off in the long run.
-- Build habits like exercising, eating well, and prioritizing mental health which can set you up for lifelong well-being.
-- Build deep friendships, relationships, and connections. It’s the decade where many lifelong bonds are formed.
-- Learn about budgeting, saving, investing, and managing credit. Financial literacy will greatly benefit you in the future.
-- Failing in your twenties is part of growth. Embrace failure and learn from it.
-- Focus on collecting experiences, such as concerts, festivals, road trips, or spontaneous adventures, rather than material goods. For memories, don’t collect shot glasses, you’ll regret it later.
-- Learn to enjoy your own company, reflect on your goals, and become comfortable with solitude.
-- Work on understanding your emotions, how to manage them, and how to empathize with others.
-- Expand your mind with literature, self-development books, and works that challenge your worldview.
-- Spend an extended period in another part of the world which can give you an appreciation for different cultures and provide life altering experiences.
-- Learn how to prepare your own meals- a valuable life skill which can help you live healthier.
-- Understand the importance of looking after your mental, physical, and emotional well-being.
—Spend time thinking about where you want to go in life, and set both short-term and long-term goals.
Don't have kids.
Get away from tech on a regular basis. Allow yourself to be in your own thoughts occasionally. I think constantly being tied to phones and the internet is killing creativity because we never have those day dreaming moments that lead to inspiration.
Don't spend huge chunks of your life on video games. They are a fun distraction but at the end of the day is it just bits on some server that could be shut down at any moment. Get off of the dopamine treadmill.
Roth IRA
“So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide. Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none. When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision. When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home.”
- Tecumseh
Learn how to learn. Having the ability to look up things on the internet, watch YouTube videos, go to the library and find books, ask people for help and even show you how to do something. Most people are willing to teach others if you're willing to learn.
I wouldn't necessarily recommend it unless you feel comfortable with it but sometimes money is tight and it's easier just to replace that 10$ part rather than call a repair guy. I've looked up how to replace a part on a water heater on the internet because it was cheap at Lowes and I didn't want to pay weekends rates for the plumber.
Also learn how to do basic things like learn how to change the oil on your car, replace your belts and change a tire. You'll save some money and feel good about being able to do these little things. Look for tools at yard sales and pawn shops if you don't have a lot to spend on tools.
Goals.
You're not going anywhere unless you DECIDE to go there.
Forget "how do I know if its the right goal"?
You're can modify and change your goals as you go. Kind of like practice?
Just do it. Start small. Review regularly. Act on the steps that reach your goal.
Travel, live abroad if possible, and experience living in a big, culture-rich city. Unfortunately the economic realities of the 2020s are making this increasingly out of reach for many youth, but if you have the resources and opportunity, absolutely go for it. As you get older, responsibilities and lack of energy will likely sap much of your ability/desire to move around as much (this isn't true for everyone, but it's extremely common). Even if traditional travel is impractical for you, there still exists cheaper opportunities for exploration that are a bit off the beaten path, such as the WWOOF program.
Regardless of your situation/location, one thing that basically anyone can do is get involved in a cause. Find something you're passionate about and throw yourself into it. Make sure it's something that you can do in-person and not virtually... as in, there are local groups you can join for this cause, although if there aren't you can always try making one or forming a local chapter of a larger org. With the right networking you'd be surprised how many other people will join you, especially for causes that involve your local community. This is a great way to meet other people, get to know the issues facing your neighborhood/city better, and learn to navigate your local government/NGOs. Again, as you get older responsibilities/exhaustion can make this sort of thing a lot harder.
Psychedelics.
Have sex with as many different attractive people as you can, using protection. You'll understand when you're older, feel older, and look older. It's a window that doesn't stay open.
Get out of your comfort zone.
Kill your sacred cow.
Figure out how to make and keep friends. It only gets more difficult as people are out of school, have their own families, have less time for short-notice adventures, etc.
At the same time, figure out what you want in a friend that is worth investing in to you. Not every friend is worth keeping as we all naturally grow in different directions.
try a bunch of stuff, find what you like, pursue that.
repeat as needed.
Travel
If you need to learn one rule it is "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you"
Have fun. As I got older, I deeply regret not going out or doing fun activities now that I am in high school. I had so much fucking time, but I wasted them all on stupid bullshit. Now I have only like 7 hours of freetime, and I can imagine that my freetime will be even less the moment I start working.
Save money into a retirement fund. Be consistent about contributing to it. Compound interest is very much your friend at this age
Have an existental crisis. I'm serious. But have a low level one, a high level will paralize you.
Move away from parents home if you haven't already. Preferably to live alone. The feeling of having a whole place to yourself is amazing.
Live way below your means, but still go out and have fun. For cheap. Dont cheap out money or time wise on things that need to last, like education, health, and shoes.
Take care of your body. It's only getting worse after that age, so you need to ensure that it doesn't go too fast.
Take care of your mind. Culture yourself, have fun, rest properly, cut off from your social life people who cause you psychological harm.
Set your own values. It's fine if you change them later on, but you need some way to ground your actions that is not "do what other people tell you to".
Learn your limits. Some are higher, some are lower, than the average person; just don't assume that you can handle vodka, work nonstop, or scale cliffs as well as someone else does. Stop punishing yourself for those limits being too low, and stop abusing the limits that are higher.
Learn how to budget. "Economise money" is easier said than done, I know; but once shit hits the fan, it's best if you know which expenses you can cut, temporarily or permanently, as well as the impact of doing so in your life.
Find people whom you can rely on. Even if you're an introvert, even if you hate dealing with people. Family, friends, you call it. And make sure that they can rely on you, it's give-and-take.
Do one adventure trip where you are out of your comfort envelope, pushing yourself physically, etc. Don't make it a booze/party trip.
Volunteer at a place if you can. Spend time in a community completely different to your own. If you have the means, live as a normal person in a country (i.e. not tourist insulated in a community of speakers of your own language) for 3 months (common tourist visa/waiver length), best if done in a country culturally different to your own. If you can't do that, at least learn a new language and consume media and interact with people (generally free these days).
Don't drift through this phase or you'll regret it later. If you go to college have a plan to graduate in 4-5 years. College isn't the place to find yourself, it's a place where you trade money for knowledge. You will learn about yourself, but you can get more self discovery in other environments for far less expense.
This is the time to establish a career and not just a job. It doesn't have to happen at 22, but you need to know what you want and work towards it by 30.
If you want kids younger is generally better, but not so early you have no means to support them. There's never a perfect time, but there are bad times for kids. Aim for a good enough time. It's a lot easier to chase a toddler at 25 than 35.
Your life will likely significantly change several times in this period, embrace it and enjoy it. Single life, dating life, married life, college life, full time job life, and parent life ate all very different. You'll experience many of these in this period.
Honestly go out and figure out your sexual preferences by exploring and experimenting. I find this happens a lot. A young couple get together in early twenties. Then they slowly drift apart because y'all honestly didn't make a solid decision on who to settle down with. It causes so much pain, heartbreak and financial stress.
Just be honest. Hit the apps and let everyone know what you're doing. Just meet people. If they are weird no big deal meet the next person. And you will probably fall in love but you have to be strong and make sure to only give that heart out to the one you know will take care of it.
When you get that feeling about a person but you know they aren't the one identify why you like them. You will probably form a pretty solid idea of your preferences this way. At least I did.
Learn how to be happy alone. Simple!
Really though, if you figure this out, a lot of other things click into place. I used to think it was impossible. Just words miserable people said to make themselves feel less lonely.
Okay, sometimes it's still that, but I've come to enjoy being able to focus on whatever I want to focus on without the distractions, drama, and/or gnawing desperation.
Breathe
Make a budget. Live by that budget for a month. On the first of the next month, make another budget.
You don't actually have to do this forever, but long enough to get the basic ebb and flow of money into your head. Planning to put more into x category means having less for y category.
Build up savings, a little at a time. Get used to dipping into that for emergencies.
Disregard if you're a billionaire or entirely living off the land.
Put money aside for the future.
Meditate as much as you can. An hour a day would not be overkill.
As a virgin, If you had an opportunity to get laid (safely) with someone you at the very least don't have negative feelings and you consider it more than average, do it. Otherwise you could regret passing in.
Vote!