What I’ve Learned So Far

How much wisdom can you accumulate by 24? Perhaps not a lifetime’s worth, but enough to share. Here’s my collection of insights—imperfect, evolving, and entirely my own.

A wise friend I met at McDonald’s once told me that life becomes increasingly nuanced with age, and that advice is inherently personal. What follows are personal observations rather than universal truths.

1. Action Cures Overthinking
When your mind becomes a maze of endless thoughts, the exit is often through your hands. Creating something tangible—whether writing, building, or making—transforms abstract anxiety into concrete reality. Each action clears mental space, creating freedom where paralysis once lived.

2. What Comes Easily, Goes Easily
Things acquired without effort often depart just as easily. Whether relationships, skills, or opportunities, the ease of acquisition often predicts their fragility. When we chase things without striving for them, they tend to slip away. This has been true for me in friendships where both parties weren’t equally invested—what started easily faded just as fast.

3. Happiness is Location-Independent
We tend to fantasize about paradise being somewhere else—Hawaii’s beaches, New York’s energy, Paris’s charm. But after traveling, I’ve realized: Your internal world shapes your happiness far more than your external one. I’ve witnessed misery in mansions and joy in tiny apartments. Happiness is a state of mind, not a destination.

4. The Tactile Trumps the Digital
In our screen-dominated world, physical objects carry unexpected power. A handwritten note left on a coworker’s desk creates more meaning than a thousand text messages. The physical realm offers connection that digital convenience cannot replicate.

5. Self-Knowledge is the Ultimate Study
There’s profound satisfaction in discovering your authentic preferences. What energizes you? What drains you? Which environments help you thrive? External exploration is valuable, but internal exploration is essential.

6. Stillness Can Be the Greatest Adventure
Travel isn’t merely transportation. Sometimes the deepest journeys happen when we remain physically still but allow our awareness to expand. One meditative hour might reveal more than a month of frantic sightseeing.

7. Meditation Isn’t Just for Monks
The practice has endured for millennia because it works. The ability to observe your thoughts, rather than being consumed by them, might be life’s most valuable skill. Peaceful moments during meditation practice are pure bliss to me.

8. Lucid Dreaming Frees Up More Time in Your Life
When you become conscious within your dreams, you access a laboratory for creativity and self-discovery that’s available to you every night. More hours of life without sacrificing sleep—who would say no to that?

9. Avoidance is the Real Stressor
Usually, the things in life you’re most stressed about are the ones you’re avoiding. Once faced, you’ll notice immediate relief. That email you’ve been avoiding? The moment you send it, relief floods in.

10. Material Things Never Offer Long-Term Satisfaction
We live in a materialist, capitalist society, where we always yearn for more, never satisfied. Ask yourself: have you ever invested in something that brought lasting happiness? Reevaluate how your spending aligns with lasting joy. I’ve found that hobbies tend to offer a high ROI in terms of the happiness they bring over time.

11. Find Your Gifts
Listen to what others have to say about you. Pay attention to recurring compliments—if multiple people say you have a talent for explaining things, it might be a strength worth exploring.

12. There’s a Playlist for Almost Every Occasion
Music can elevate any experience. Find the soundtrack that matches your mood or activity, and it’ll make everything more enjoyable. Life, much like art, imitates the movies—each moment is amplified by the right song, and so the circle continues.

13. Listen to Yourself
My dad always says he lives every day as if it were his last, and I find that incredibly inspiring. When I do a mundane task like doing the dishes and think, “How would I do this if it were my last time?” it adds a new sense of appreciation. This mindset helps me approach life with authenticity and clarifies my priorities, no matter where I am.

14. Feeling Uninspired?
Sometimes I struggle with creativity. Even though I feel the urge to create, I often don’t know what to create—whether it should be painting, writing, or something else. After reading Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act, I realized that trying to copy someone else’s art leads to the creation of new, unique pieces. Now, whenever I feel uninspired, I walk into a museum and try to copy what resonates with me. The result is always a piece of art that doesn’t resemble the original at all.

15. Write Down What You Think
A personal journal helps immensely in processing the emotions and thoughts racing through your head. By getting them out, you’ll often feel a sense of relief. Writing also helps you analyze patterns. Looking back at my journal entries from when I was 20, I can see how some thoughts and emotions shift over time and what their sources were. More self-awareness is rarely a bad thing.