When we are children or teenagers, it is hard to know what life and the adult world will really be like, and if only someone could warn us so we could prepare properly to survive the “jungle”.
We have put together 26 lessons we believe every child or teenager should know.
If you have children, print this article and make sure that, when the time comes, they have it at hand. Life can be hard, or not what we imagined, but knowing what lies ahead, it is truly worth living it to the full.
26 lessons every child and teenager should know
1. At school, you learn the lesson first and then take the exam. In real life you are tested all the time, with the difference that you face life’s tests first and learn the lesson afterwards.
2. Be nice to the “nerds” (the class swots), because there is a good chance you will end up working for one of them. This was said by Bill Gates himself.
3. Not everyone is going to like you
It is hard to say, but you will probably face a lot of rejection, so don’t waste a minute more than necessary on someone who isn’t willing to spend that time on you.
4. Television doesn’t reflect real life: in real life, people don’t spend all that time in a coffee shop, because they have to go to work.
5. As a child you get a lot of things by crying, but in real life, if you want something, you won’t get it by crying. You will have to work very hard to achieve it.
6. Your parents may be poor, have no education and work in very badly paid jobs, to the point where you think they have nothing to teach you. With time you will discover that the best advice a person gets usually comes from their own parents, because they are the last people in the world who would want to hurt you.
7. Life isn’t always fair
You will have to get used to injustice, but never let it break you when something unfair happens. Quite the opposite: fight for what is fair.
8. You won’t be able to win every battle life throws at you, so choose very carefully the ones you are willing to fight.
9. You will make plenty of mistakes and will probably fail now and then. When that happens, don’t blame luck or your parents. Accept that it was your fault and learn the lesson for next time.
10. You will never be able to please everyone. In life you will have to make decisions that will probably upset some people and please others. Always remember that when making decisions, you should do what your heart tells you.
11. Learn to be rubber and steel. Steel is hard and tough. Be like steel when it comes to comments, attacks and destructive criticism whose only aim is to bring you down. Rubber is flexible, so try to be like rubber when dealing with people who may think differently or hold opinions that differ from yours.
12. Be an honest person with integrity
Honesty and integrity are two fundamental pillars of a decent person. Always do what you believe is right, and remember that it can take years to earn other people’s trust and only a few minutes to destroy it completely.
13. Never stop learning. As Warren Buffett put it, there are two kinds of people who fail in life: those who know nothing and those who think they know everything. Be humble so you can keep learning from people. You learn from those you least expect.
14. Don’t go looking for happiness
If you insist on chasing it, you will never find it. Do what you enjoy, surround yourself with worthwhile, healthy people, be honest, upright and humble, aware that in this life you have to work hard and make an effort, and only then will happiness find you.
15. Life is a constant competition, and it is usually won by the person who doesn’t give up in the face of adversity. Remember that a race is not won by the fastest runner, but by the one who keeps running when everyone else has slowed down.
16. 90% of the problems you will have as an adult will come down to that wretched thing called money. People will tell you that money isn’t important, but even so, try to keep your finances healthy so you never have to find out for yourself how false it is that money doesn’t help you be happier. At school, high school and university they won’t teach you anything about financial education, so learn how money works as soon as you can. (How to teach our children about money.)
17. Be careful with money, because in order to get it you will sometimes be tempted, or forced, to do things you don’t really want to do. Always try to have a code of ethics.
18. Never lose your sense of humour
Problems and worries don’t usually go away because we get angry or depressed. You will meet people who have some good days and some bad days. Don’t be like them: always have a good day, because otherwise you will have more and more bad ones.
19. As a rule, we like what is easy and run away from what is difficult. With time you will discover that the things most worth having are rarely the easy ones.
20. Although there are exceptions, statistics tell us that your first great love probably won’t be your last, so be careful about making decisions based only on your heart that could affect the rest of your life. You may not understand this now, but perhaps one day you will have to tell your own children the same thing.
21. In life you will meet three kinds of people: those who are there for the good times, those who don’t stick around for the bad times, and those who stand by you in every situation and circumstance. Send the first two groups packing.
22. Never pretend to be someone else to win over a group of people. In this crazy world full of sheep, being the odd one out is not a flaw; it will be your greatest strength. It may take you a while to understand this.
23. If you have a dream, fight for it with all your strength. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t achieve something just because they weren’t able to achieve it themselves. (Always swap the word “impossible” for “improbable”.)
24. You will come across two kinds of problems in life: 1. Those that have no solution, and are therefore not really problems but something you have to live with. 2. Those that do have a solution, and are therefore not problems either. Focus your energy on the solution, not on the problem.
25. Viktor Frankl said, in essence, that sometimes we cannot stop situations that cause us pain from coming into our lives, but it is in our hands to choose the attitude with which we face them.
26. As Rocky Balboa told his son: the world is not all happiness and bright colours. It is a terrible place, and however tough you are, it will beat you to your knees if you let it. It doesn’t matter how strong you are or how hard you can hit, but how hard you can be hit. Life hits and hits, but you have to take those blows and keep moving forward. That is how you win. If you know what you are worth, go and get what you deserve, but you will have to take those blows.
Further reading
Featured image: Prof. Dr. Franz Vesely, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
