21 Things I’ve Learned in 21 Years

So I’m 21 now. I’m officially official as of 2:32pm. Actually, I still don’t think I can legally rent a “luxury car” at certain places. Bummer.

In all seriousness though, here’s 21 of the most important things I’ve learned in my 21 years of life:

1) The most important part of the day is how you start it. Waking up fully rested with plenty of time before you have to walk out the door is a magnificent feeling. Pour a cup of coffee, do some reading, take a shower, and get ready for the day. It’s so much better than frantically rushing out the door, skipping breakfast, and getting to class with 2.7 seconds to spare. It affects my attitude for the rest of the day.

2) There is no substitute for quality time with family. Growing up, I always loved spending time with my family and extended family. But being away at college has shown me the value of this even more.

3) Accountability is necessary to form good habits and break old ones. It’s one thing to say you’re going to do something, be it break a bad habit, develop a good one, or do something challenging. It’s another to tell someone about it and have him or her hold you to it.

4) Get involved with things you care about and believe in. In middle school and freshman year of high school, I was that guy who went to school and went straight home when the last bell rang. It wasn’t until I had the opportunity to help start FCA at my high school that I realized the value of contributing your talents and passions to make a difference in your sphere of influence.

5) Find an older person to invest in you. There’s so much wisdom out there to be gleaned from people who have been right where we are. Take advantage of it!

6) Find a younger person to invest in. At the same time, what good is it if you can’t share what you’ve learned and pour into another life?

7) Taking frequent trips outside of your comfort zone is good for you. The really important stuff in life happens outside our comfort zone. It’s where we grow the most. Seth Godin says, “The tiny cost of failure is dwarfed by the huge cost of not trying.” Be like Tom Petty and don’t back down from the things that scare you.

8) People are way more important than tasks. It’s super easy to get caught up in daily responsibilities. School, work, buying groceries, etc. We forget that building genuine relationships far outweighs and outlasts short-term tasks.

9) Play full out. At my senior prom, I complemented a friend on how hard he was dancing and going all out. He simply responded, “Go hard or don’t go.” He’s right. If it’s a worthwhile pursuit, why go half speed?

10) Make exercise a non-negotiable part of your week. When I played football in high school, we would run stadiums until you lost everything in your stomach (I’m not even joking). I’m not an advocate of exercising until you die, but it’s crucial to find a healthy activity you enjoy and get after it. It will have a drastically positive effect on your mood and how you feel in general. Accountability helps here as well.

11) Watch, read, and listen to good stuff. When I was a freshman, my public speaking professor told us that he is often approached by students who claim they cannot think of a topic to speak on. He said the first thing he asks them is “What are you feeding your brain?” If all you do is play Xbox and watch Netflix, no wonder you can’t think of something to speak on. What you put in is what you get out.

12) Travel as much as you can. Besides the adventure of exploring new places, I think traveling makes you a more interesting person. It opens up your world a little more and broadens your perspective. It also creates some entertaining conversations. Just ask me about Venice Beach, CA sometime.

13) It’s okay to fall flat on your face, as long as you learn something from it. Randy Pausch said, “Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted.” There are countless things I’ve failed at that I am immensely thankful for in retrospect. Sometimes we learn more from failure than we do from success. The key here is not letting failure change how you define yourself, and intentionally asking, “What did I learn from this experience?”

14) Authentic leaders are servants. True leaders are for others, not themselves. They use their influence to serve and empower their people. They don’t mind who gets the credit, as long as positive change is made.

15) Be vulnerable and honest around the right people. It’s paramount to surround yourself with like-minded people who speak truth and wisdom into your life. They are the people with whom you can put down all your walls and dive deep into life-on-life fellowship.

16) Don’t compare your life to your friends’ social media accounts. Social media only displays the “highlights” of peoples’ lives. You see the travels, the fun times, the successes. Rarely do you see the real person and the true life behind it.

17) Intentional dating is the only way to date. “Intentional” means to do something on purpose—to be upfront, clear, and honest about your intentions. It takes leadership and courage, and it’s ultimately not about you.  When I was younger (because I’m so old and decrepit now), it took a while for this to really click (see #13).

18) Hard work must be coupled with smart work. A strong work ethic will only go so far if we do not also work “smart.” Sometimes our work strategy is more important than our work effort, though they are both essential.

19) Smile a lot. It matters. It impacts how you feel and how you make others around you feel. Studies have proven it fact.

20) Laugh at yourself. It’s okay to be a ridiculous and awkward person sometimes. It took me a while to really learn how to do that. For most of high school, I was a down-to-business no nonsense kind of guy. There are certain times for that, but there’s also a time to laugh at yourself and turn off the serious switch.

21) Jesus is really all that matters. I don’t think it’s any secret that my writing is filtered through a biblical worldview. At the end of the day, Jesus is the reason I have life. Not because of how hard I work, or how often I go to church, or what I say, or how “good” of a life I live. The gospel has nothing to do with human merit. It has everything to do with Jesus living the perfect life we could never live and suffering the punishment that we deserve, so that we could have life through his righteousness and resurrection. In the words of Tim Keller, “Jesus lost all his glory so that we could be clothed in it. He was shut out so we could get in.”

So yeah. There’s 21 things. Maybe I’ll do this again when I’m 30 or something.

What are the [insert your age number here] most important things you’ve learned throughout your life?

 

Check out last year’s post from my 20th birthday: The Teen Years