Powerful Life Lessons I've Realized Before It's Too Late

life has its ways of teaching in ways we don’t understand.

some of you may have realized this prior to opening this article up, some of you haven’t and its the first time you’ve realized such a truth.

normally when it comes to the most valuable advice out there, you can’t force it directly.

lessons are nothing to be brute forced their way into acknowledging.

sometimes they come by way indirectly, when we least expect it.

people would attribute this to something called, serendipity, where you would find valuable or agreeable things entirely by chance, luck, or an accident.

some lessons but not all, are like this.

but when it comes to life, we need to understand that everyday has some lesson to teach us. as human beings we are extremely well at adapting.

we learn every single day, finding answers in ways that can help accelerate progress.

maybe we find the answers from the insights from others as well. our elders can teach those that are growing up the same way those growing up can teach elders.

and i’ll be honest though, I don’t have all the answers to everything, I never will, nor will you.

but one things for certain, the answers to some questions will reveal themselves naturally over time, through finding out the hard way, coming across them indirectly, or learning from others.

these are the only three outcomes.

there will not be anything else.

sun beaming through the window. fresh from waking up from a well-needed rest, considering I was very tired yesterday. my mind is racing with thoughts, not clouded from social media and the type that can make you feel like you can write a whole novel without burning out.

i’ve always wondered why most people lay on their death bed not realizing lessons that could’ve saved them time, money, or relationships.

but understanding that everyone has their own timeline and journey is the basis to some questions in life. some will realize it later on, some never, and for all of you reading this, today.

as always, do approach all of this with an open mind.

lets get into it.

“take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.” - Napoleon Bonaparte

a lot of us tend to hesitate and second guess our own decision-making, this is normal and a part of human nature to do so.

but understand that hesitation in its own was an evolutionary survival mechanism.

it was used to help us process information and pause before making pivotal decisions, usually when the outcomes ahead of us were uncertain.

however, times have changed.

we now live in an era of abundance and convenience, still operating on our same survival mechanisms designed for scarcity & survival.

our mind can send us into emotional processing because it can’t tell the difference between risk in our own head versus reality.

this is the underlying mechanism of that.

but for you, this mechanism needs to be dismantled because we’re not dealing with frequent life or death situations anymore.

so understand this:

no opportunity is always guaranteed in life.

and chasing them directly usually makes it all the much harder to find these same opportunities.

so for our case, whenever an opportunity sticks itself out like a sore thumb, go all in.

do so in on a level like you’re trying to desperately gasp for air underwater. because you’ll never know what will happen at the other end of uncertainty, take that chance like your entire future depends on it.

either you learn from that decision, or you grow from that momentum.

there is no in-between.

most importantly, when met with uncertainty or an opportunity you’re unsure of, ask yourself:

what’s the best that could happen?

meeting uncertainty in this lens turns anxiety into hope, and converts doubt into optimism.

so go all in when the path ahead is unclear, you won’t regret it.

let’s be honest, no one likes a complainer.

its incredibly draining to be around someone that constantly moans and groans about how things aren’t going their way.

the complaining can manifest in the form of victimization, excuses, or resentment towards ones circumstances.

all unhealthy behaviors with absolutely no upside.

when you complain about your life, a specific situation, another person, or event, thinking about it rationally you’d find that it won’t make any difference on the outcome.

sure you’ll release some steam and in the short-term you’ll dump your thoughts out into the world, instead of bottling it all up.

this is a fair argument, yes.

but imagine being someone on the receiving end of this, how drained they would feel if someone was blaming everything but themselves?

making this a habit robs you of accountability.

instead of hoping a problem would spontaneously fix itself, you by complaining willingly inflate the problem to something bigger than it is.

you’re now not dealing with an external issue, but now you’re battling your own self and mind.

if you subconsciously identify as someone who complains often, deep down you’re just trying to protect your ego.

your defense mechanisms activate to protect an underlying identity you might have deep down.

the antidote to complaining is practicing resilience.

one of the core principles of Stoicism is the Dichotomy of control, essentially let go of what’s outside of your control, focus on what’s within your control.

external circumstances or outcomes are out of your control in this case.

while what’s within your control is how you react to these external circumstances, that being your response to them.

complaining can be subconscious but most of the time, you’re choosing to speak out in resentment.

you need to work on this if this is a weak point for you. if things don’t go your way, instead of reacting with every single feeling, understand that these emotions pass and go.

not every emotion is meant to be engaged.

the gap between the stimuli that you receive and the response you give is where the power is.

so if you’re stuck in traffic with friends, cars are going slow as hell, and you’re in the middle of it all? don’t complain right in front of them because you’ll kill the energy.

control yourself and understand that you’ll eventually arrive at your destination.

the true test of patience here is ones ability to sit in the middle of unfortunate circumstances without losing self-control.

so don’t be that complainer, please.

your quality of life will improve if this habit is removed from your subconscious.

whether you agree or not with this lesson, I want you to pay attention.

this is a warning against spoon feeding or hand holding, and no, I don’t mean this literally, but metaphorically.

what I mean specifically is that we can’t always rely on someone else to help us. being overdependent on some external source can pose more problems than you think.

chances are most of you reading this are a fully grown adult.

if you are, you’re someone that is entirely responsible for your own decisions and judgment.

there is obvious exceptions to this but you can’t blame your environment or how you grew up anymore.

you end up victimizing yourself, and that’s is just another form of digging yourself a hole that’ll be hard to get out of.

accountability is the name of the game, so understand that you are exactly where you need to be.

and to add on to this, we’ll discuss something called the Law Of Accumulation.

this was created by Brian Tracy, where it basically describes that the outcomes and achievements of your are the result thousands of small, unseen daily actions that compounded prior.

all these daily actions are neutral, and produce binary outcomes.

either the actions you take will move you closer to your goal, or away from them. there’s no in-between.

keeping this in mind you should understand that you’re entirely responsible for your own destiny and the trajectory you’re going down.

no one is going to save you from a stagnant life but yourself.

no one is going to save you from your own laziness but yourself.

no one is going to save you from your own self-loathing but yourself.

there will be pressure when it comes to this realization.

but a good kind of pressure that’ll force you to radically act and make decisions for yourself rather than waiting for someone to make a decision for you that’ll never come.

“what the superior man seeks is in himself; what the small man seeks is in others.” - Confucius

a lot of people talk about external validation but never really practice deviating from the trap it lays out.

but understand this:

we live in an age where social media is convincing us that anything and everything should be posted online.

our plans, our relationships, our achievements, our milestones, our new order from the coffee shop.

we’ve quite literally destroyed the wall between what separates our private life between the public eye.

in doing so, most end up chasing approval like its their life force, but this same approval is poisonous.

here’s a fundamental truth I want you to realize:

external validation is one of the worst foundations to base your self-worth on.

reread that again.

the thing about external validation is that its dangerous when its something you rely on as fuel to keep going.

when you outsource your self-esteem and confidence onto other people, you enslave yourself to their expectations and perceptions of you.

this is why Naval said:

“the enemy of peace of mind is expectations drilled into you by society and other people.”

you can’t control external approval, the same reason you can’t control how many likes or engagement you get on your channel or publication.

you also shouldn’t ask permission from other people all the time to do something, tying back to the previous lesson, you have to save yourself.

you don’t need to let the world know your every move as well.

because sometimes moving in silence and being overlooked is the more peaceful route.

in short, external validation is invariably short-term, and fleeting.

switch to internally validating yourself, develop an internal locus of control, and give yourself the permission to do anything instead of outsourcing it to others.

the upsides to doing so outweigh the downsides tremendously.

simple but powerful lesson.

a lot of people tend to explain themselves to people who already made up their minds.

some may cling onto a certain person, begging them to stay in their own lives like their life depends on it.

but in that certain person mind, they made a decision that was processed before it was even expressed.

when it comes to those kind of people, the most radical and useful act you can do is to not explain yourself.

what’s important to consider is that you should step away when it matters.

have that self-respect needed when interacting with people, especially those that have wronged you.

save your energy especially instead of wasting it on debates that’ll lead nowhere. because its hard to convince a mind that has already made conclusions and judgments about you.

if someone cut you off, its best to drop it and not re-contact that person.

only doing so will just reinforce their decision about cutting you off further.

there was one such example that happened in my own life. i’ve cut off a former friend and she ended up trying to contact me everywhere, borderline stalking me in the process.

i knew I was right with my judgment and intuition, so I’ll continue standing on my decision as a result. she may be that someone that wanted to explain herself, but I already decided on my end.

save your energy, and establish boundaries for yourself. because action will always speak louder than words.

“vincit qui se vincit | he conquers who conquers himself.”

easy to realize, hard to practice.

we tend to fall victim to our own emotions and feelings at times to make decisions, that’s totally normal.

but if that is your current baseline, things need to change.

we know of the saying, discipline over motivation. its quite literally repeated across all of self-improvement social media to the point where its drilled into our brains.

but it still holds power, a lot of power than most may realize.

when you stick to your plan, and be a person of your word instead of lying to yourself, you genuinely outrun everyone else.

most people let one bad day get to them, spiral for a moment, then throw their entire agenda for the day out the window.

this gives way for the path of least resistance to become a coping mechanism when things go south.

you have to continue moving forward even if your body is telling you no.

let your rationality overpower your emotional processing when it matters.

look at the greats of history.

they’ve had days where they wanted to sleep in, hit the snooze button, and watch TV shows all day.

anyone would want the comfort of that, its a great life, for some.

but they don’t just stop there, even if their tired body is pulling them into comfort, they don’t submit to their mood, they submit to the future they are trying to build.

the legacy they are trying to solidify.

the impact they are trying to spread across history.

look at Michael Jordan during the 1997 NBA finals. during game 5, he played while having Flu like symptoms.

he could’ve sat out and told the coach that he wanted to be on the bench and rest for future games, but he willed himself to give it his all despite the condition he was in.

because winning meant more to him than any sickness holding him back.

he knew the plan for winning it all for Chicago meant more than a mere temporary sickness, he knew he was the key to winning the championship.

this is an extreme example, but you shouldn’t operate on a level where your mood will give way to an outcome you wouldn’t otherwise be satisfied with.

stick to your plan, and you’ll reap what you harvest if you keep consistently showing up.

this might be a slap in a face for most of you, so do pay attention.

life simply boiled down is all about inputs and outputs.

you want to build a project to show the world? your inputs have to be time, energy, focus, and maybe some capital.

you want to build a large publication on Substack? your inputs have to be of course time, energy, and your own judgment or creativity.

understood?

inputs require doing, actionable steps, and execution.

without putting in something, you won’t get out anything of value.

you need experience, both good and bad, to fuel progress. the doers gain fruitful amounts of experience daily, but what about the thinkers?

we can characterize the thinkers as those who excessively over-consume and learn.

the need to be “dangerously overeducated” as people put it nowadays.

but this can work against you, it can fuel a perfectionist mentality. the type of mentality that goes, “i’ll start when I watch one more how-to video!”

“just a couple of more notes then i’ll be ready!”

“i just need a couple of more hours to study then I’ll figure it out.”

terrible mentality, this can be a trap if you’re objectively overprepared.

you become prone to analysis paralysis, and can develop a cognitive dissonance where a bunch of information you consumed can contradict each other, affecting your decision making.

life doesn’t reward you for knowledge, but action.

“you don’t need to figure things out first before you start, but start anyway so you can figure things out along the way.”

you need to understand this fundamental truth:

action energizes you, stagnation drains you.

powerful huh? read that again.

you can be someone that loads up on theory, which is good, yes. but if that’s all you do, then you end up stagnating because you’re not developing any skin in the game.

the thinkers get far, the doers get farther because they have something the thinkers don’t.

feedback, experience, more knowledge from living in the arena instead of being a spectator.

don’t be that spectator, be the gladiator putting your head down and doing.

“your actions speak so loudly, I can not hear what you are saying.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

there is no endpoint in this life where continuous learning and evolution are the keys to growth every day.

this same learning and evolution will manifest in the form of lessons.

where lessons breed wisdom, as a result of maybe pain or going through experiences the hard way.

so to refresh your mind, lets go over each lesson here briefly:

if an opportunity presents itself to you, go all in. - never hesitate when it comes to seizing temporary opportunities. life is short and if you blink, you’ll might miss them. so please go all in when you get the chance.

never complain and show others you are complaining. - this is an incredibly draining way to express yourself, and will drain others in the process of you doing this. avoid this like the plague, short-term it may be relieving but objectively, complaining won’t change your outcomes or circumstances.

no one is coming to save you. - not in a way to put pressure on you, but as a realization that you can’t always depend on someone else to make the decisions for you. have some accountability, you are the author of your destiny.

let go of external validation, it’s poisonous. - social media has us convinced that we need to absolutely post everything for the world to see. the fact is, we don’t. external validation is out of your control, focus on internally validating yourself and focusing on what really matters, yourself.

don’t explain yourself to people that have already decided. - stepping away when it matters is one of the most radically important acts you can do. have some self-respect, and don’t explain yourself because it’ll reinforce the decision people already made about you.

stick to your plan, not your mood. - rationally you need to discipline yourself to keep showing up, and stay consistent. its up to us if we want to dedicate our goals to our long-term vision, or our short-term feelings.

life rewards the doer, not the thinker. - theory and dreaming matters, but if that’s all you do, then you need to wake up and act. the doers have something the thinkers don’t, skin in the game. life rewards the gladiators, not the spectators.

true wisdom is learning from these lessons from others, and myself, instead of finding out the hard way yourself.

take this information and embody it today. don’t be the latter of finding out the hard way.

a lesson learned from another will always be better than a lesson learned yourself.

nonetheless, do what you will.

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