today is my 40th birthday here are all the things that I know at 40 that I wish I knew at 20 starting with number one your relationship with others is a direct reflection of your relationship with yourself if you treat yourself poorly then you will unconsciously seek out and tolerate others who treat you poorly as well if you treat yourself with dignity and respect then you will only tolerate others who treat you with dignity and respect too number two the only way to feel better about yourself is to do things worth feeling good about respect is earned not given number three the only failure is not trying the only rejection is not asking the only mistake is not risking anything success and failure are fuzzy Concepts that only exist in your mind before you do something not after after the fact everything will be a mixture of both the only real failure is doing nothing number four no one is coming to save you no single thing will solve all your problems no goal no achievement no relationship no one will ever fix you you will always feel mildly inadequate and somewhat dissatisfied with your life nothing is wrong with you for feeling this way on the contrary it might be the most normal thing about you number five be the partner you want to have if you want a healthy and fit partner then be healthy and fit yourself if you want a loyal and trustworthy partner then be loyal and trustworthy yourself to put it another way would you date you if not then that's a [ __ ] problem number six the most valuable things in life compound over a long period of time I'm talking about health wealth knowledge confidence relationships these things will frust you when you're young because they are slow but if you start building them from a young age and you don't stop by the time you're in your 30s and 40s you will have an incredible life number seven the most sexy and exciting things in life are the opposite they start out extremely fun but then have intense diminishing returns when you're young these things distract you and occupy a lot of your time and attention this applies to social media casual sex drugs and alcohol video games gambling vacations and [ __ ] the first time is incredible ible the second time is almost as good but then it's all downhill from there well except for the [ __ ] number eight if you're not turning down things that excite you then you're not focused enough on something that matters our world is overflowing with stimulation and opportunity if you aren't struggling to turn down options then you haven't correctly prioritized what matters to you number nine taking responsibility for all of your problems alleviates more suffering than it creates most people assume that if you take responsibility for all the pain in your life then you will just feel worse about it but the opposite is actually true the more responsibility you take the more you Empower yourself to actually do something about that pain that's because number 10 you give power to who you blame when you blame someone else for your problems you are giving them power over you you're allowing them to Define and dictate your happiness and well-being this is [ __ ] stupid so don't do it it's not worth it number 11 if you have to tell someone you're that then you're not that a rich man doesn't feel a need to to show people he's Rich a smart man doesn't feel a need to tell people he's smart a confident person doesn't have to show people that he's confident he just is don't say it be it number 12 motivation is not the cause of action but the effect if you want to feel motivated to do something take the smallest action towards doing it then let the momentum carry you forward number 13 love is not the cause of commitment but the effect you don't wait until you have a perfect relationship to commit to a person you commit to the person in order to create the perfect relationship ship 14 passion is not the cause of good work but the effect you don't wait until you find something you love doing you learn to do something well in the process of developing competency and agency then causes you to become passionate about it where's my paint thinner number 15 the person you marry is the person you fight with the house you buy is the house you repair the dream job you take is the job you stress over everything comes with an inherent sacrifice to it whatever makes us feel good will inevitably also make us feel bad number 16 a happy life is not a life without stress it's a life of meaningful stress number 17 don't view exercise as an exchange for something you don't work out to lose a few pounds or earn that hamburger and ice cream with this mindset you will lose motivation quickly and quit instead view exercise as an investment for every unit of energy you put in you will receive multiple units of energy back the catch is that these units of energy you get back will be spread out over weeks months and years this is why exercising hardcore occasionally is far inferior than exercising a little bit every day okay so here's a bonus thing that I kind of knew at 20 but I definitely know at 40 and that is meditation makes everything else in life easier which leads me to the sponsor of this video headspace the meditation app meditation is one of the most scientifically validated mental practices you can do it's been shown to reduce stress improve sleep increase memory and focus and improve General feelings of well well being and best of all you can do it literally anywhere you can do it at home on a bus at work even while you're taking a [ __ ] head space is great because it has thousands of hours of guided meditations to help you develop a practice for yourself I've been meditating since I was 18 and it's been one of most useful practices that I found to help me improve my life and fun fact I was a customer of headspace back in 2015 so I guess you could say I knew them before they were cool check out the link in the description to get the first 60 days for free that's a lot of days by the way like if you meditated 10 minutes a day for 60 days that's 10 hours of free guided meditations that's a lot of [ __ ] meditation so check it out back to the life lessons number 18 trust people most of them are good and while you might get hurt or embarrassed sometimes the alternative is just way worse number 19 there's no such thing as a life without problems warn Buffett as money problems a homeless guy has money problems Buffett's money problems are way more desirable than the homeless guys problem s don't just disappear they get exchanged and upgraded for better problems as you grow and evolve the solution to today's problem will be the seed of tomorrow's number 20 growth is rarely accompanied by joy and celebration on the contrary growth is usually painful to some degree that's because growth requires loss a loss of your old values your old behaviors your old loves your old identity change always has a component of grief to it so be sure to let yourself grieve number 21 statistically speaking a normal person is physically unhealthy emotionally anxious and depressed socially lonely and financially in debt [ __ ] being normal number 22 if you can't say no then your yeses mean nothing we are defined by what we give up what we sacrifice and what we reject if you sacrifice nothing and reject nothing then you have no identity you're merely a reflection of the preferences and demands of the people around you in other words if you don't decide who you are other people will decide for you number 23 be careful how you define yourself your identity is a self-constructed mental prison confining you to a life of Desperately Seeking and finding things to validate whatever you've chosen to become Define yourself as Loosely and Ambiguously as possible you will feel less defensive towards the world and be willing to change when it's necessary number 24 don't make assumptions about people you have no [ __ ] idea what they've been through don't make assumptions about yourself either the last person we're objective about is ourselves number 25 no one thinks about you as much as you think about yourself whatever you are insecure about chances are 99% of people around you haven't even noticed it this is because everybody else is too busy thinking about themselves this may strike you as a little bit depressing but it's actually liberating it means that you are judged far less than you think number 26 confidence does not come from an expectation of success it comes from a comfort with failure there's a word for someone who feels a need to succeed at everything a [ __ ] narcissist number 27 develop a willing to be disliked it will grant you the freedom to do what needs to be done even if it's unpopular number 28 you cannot be a life-changing presence to some people without also being a complete [ __ ] joke to others part of the price of having impact is some hate and usually that hate is proportional to the impact number 29 floss and wear sunscreen every day look I know I sound like your mom right now but trust me in 20 years you're going to be thanking me number 30 extraordinary results come from repeating ordinary actions over an unordinary amount of time any overnight success is secretly the result of quietly working at obscurity for years if not decades number 31 choosing a partner is not about romance you're also choosing a confidant a counselor career advisor therapist investor teacher travel buddy roommate best friend business partner and no I'm not saying you should make your partner be all these things I'm saying whether you want to or not your partner is going to become all of these things that's what a relationship is is so choose [ __ ] wisely number 32 don't overestimate romantic love love doesn't fix relationship problems it doesn't make trust issues go away the truth is love can harm as much as it heals it's an amplifier it makes a good relationship better and a bad relationship much worse don't get me wrong love is great I mean Love is Beautiful when it works right but for a healthy relationship by itself love is not enough number 33 trust is the currency of all relationships every good relationship is built off back think I have something in my teeth FL every good relationship is built off the back of years of trust every failed relationship fails because of broken trust therefore honesty and integrity are the backbones of a life of healthy relationships and therefore happiness dishonesty and a lack of Integrity might be a shortcut to some short-term gains but you're completely [ __ ] yourself in the long run so [ __ ] stop it number 34 speaking of which if all of your relationships have the same problem then news flash you're the [ __ ] problem number 35 there's no such thing as a bad emotion only a bad response to an emotion every emotion can be used constructively or destructively one of the most useful things you can ever learn in your life is to figure out how to channel your negative emotions constructively number 36 my whole life I always promised myself I would never be that guy who went to bed at 9:00 p.m. on a Friday and I would never be that guy who got up at 5 a.m. to hit the [ __ ] gym and get after it but kids I hate to tell you mornings are the real [ __ ] number 37 you don't have to prove anything to anyone including yourself let me say that again for the people in the back you don't have to prove anything to anyone including yourself number 38 life advice is like clothing try it on and if it doesn't fit discard it try something else and like clothing bad advice will be useless within a few weeks but good advice it will last you a lifetime number 39 nothing meaningful in life is easy and nothing easy in life is Meaningful we think we'd like to have everything handed to us on a silver platter but the truth is that we don't appreciate or enjoy things that we don't struggle for so stop avoiding the difficult things in your life and instead find the difficult things you enjoy and finally number 40 it's never too late to change a friend of mine once told me a story about his grandmother he said that when her husband died she was 62 and for the first time in her life she began to take piano lessons for weeks she practiced all day every day at first the family thought it was just a phase a way for her to process her grief but months went by and she continued to play every day people started to wonder if she was crazy or something was wrong with her they told her to give it up face reality I mean she was old by the time she was in her 9s she had been playing piano every day for over 30 years longer than most professional musicians have been alive she had mastered all of the classics Mozart Beethoven Bach Baldi everyone who heard her play swore that she must have been a concert pianist in her youth no one believed her when she said that she took her first lesson in her 60s I love this story because it shows that even at an impractical old age in life you still have more time left to learn something than most professionals at that thing have even been alive I didn't start writing until I was 27 I didn't start this YouTube channel until I was 36 in every phase of my life I've started 5 to 10 years later than most people yet it didn't matter it's never too late I get emails all the time from people asking me hey I'm 20 or 40 or 60 or 80 is it too late can I change is there time the answer is it's never too late there's always time the only question is how long we're going to sit here and make excuses and pretend there's not all right guys that was fun I'll see you when I'm [Music] 50