Question for the older guys here:

- What would you tell your 25yr old self? What advice would you give yourself?

- What do you think 25 yr olds should be doing at 25?

(If I could) I'd tell 20 yr old self a lot of good stuff. (I'm 25 right now)

I post ITT as top 5% intellects of 2p2 seems to be here, and I'm hoping BFI related advices.

I would tell myself "Don't make any serious plans, because you are clueless."

Figure out what it is you want to do with your life and get your career squared away!

finance baby!!!!!!

*** everything else..... (and *** that secretary* - you'll so have fun)

edit: *the redhead one

this is for 18 year-old

if it applies to you at 25 you're doing it wrong

- Don't waste your money on things that don't matter (brands/status symbols/luxury goods), but also be careful because social signalling is a very powerful force.

- You can often trade time to save money, but it's rarely worth it.

- Save, build an emergency fund, then grow your appreciating assets. Having that XX,XXX cushion makes everything easier and opens a lot of possibilities.

- Avoid depreciating assets. If you have to have something, buy used to take a smaller hit.

- Avoid things that waste your time and tempt you to buy crap. TV/magazines/auto review web sites/etc. Get some real hobbies instead of watching other people do stuff.

- Time is ticking on your career. You better make it a priority, learn skills, and advance now. It gets harder and harder later on.

- Time is ticking on your relationships, too. Very few hot and smart girls - that don't have a lot of baggage - are still available past 25-27.

(I'm 32.)

BTL is a license to print money. Keep buying, keep letting be very very rich, enjoy

sadly not true anymore but the yields and opportunity back then were plain silly and I almost knew it.

dc_p has a good list. Here are some of mine that don't already overlap his:


Get rid of your ego.

Take care of your body and you can have almost as much fun with it in your 30s as you are having with it now.

Stop caring what other people think. Other people are for the most part ****ing idiots.

Build your professional network. Stay in touch with people. It is almost always who you know, not what you know.

Chasing women is not anywhere as efficient as chasing money, because women chase money. Chase the money, and watch as the women chase you. That way you wind up with both.

Figure out what is important to you, and why it is important. Don't be afraid to question these things and adjust as necessary. In fact, consciously do that at regular intervals.

Learn about cognitive biases. Incorporate continual awareness of them into all of your thought processes, analyses, and behavior choices.

Learn about finance, trading, and investing. Combine this knowledge with your cognitive biases knowledge to crush the market and retire before you are 30.

Seriously, most other people are complete ****ing idiots driven entirely by their limbic systems. Do not worry what they think. Join Team Neocortex. Don't become a robot, but don't let your amygdala control you. Spend time with self-aware smart people who understand they don't know **** but who strive to learn more about themselves and the world around them, and become better people. This is what you should do.

Be happy. Yes, it's a choice.

One more I just thought of -

It doesn't matter how smart you are if you don't get off your ass and do something with your smarts. The world is full of armchair geniuses. The people who succeed are the ones who apply themselves and actually use their smarts. The ones who sit around due to fear or laziness just end up bitter and resentful. Get out there and take a risk.


and that leads to a second:

You'll generally regret the things you didn't do more than the things you did do. Give it a shot, whatever it is. Ask her out, start the business, try the interesting hobby. If you fail or it doesn't work out, move on. You will almost certainly end up regretting it if you never even tried. Open your mouth and say something. Take that step. Do that thing. Give it a shot. Regardless of the outcome, you'll be happy you did. And you'll almost certainly end up with a ton of awesome stories and a much richer life story.

Not that much older than 25, but...

a) Youth is the time for risk. Living overseas, changing careers, falling in love, packing up and changing your entire reality are things you can do easily at this age.

b) In deference to (a), build as much as you can on top of what you have. Have savings? Put a portion away and build on it. Have a good circle of friends? Go out and meet more people, from different walks of live. If you don't know dancers, musicians, stock brokers, journalists, old money, etc, then your world is too small and you're missing out on very valuable things. Have a good family? Deepen your relationship with them. Have a skill you're good at? Challenge yourself and become exceptional at it. There is nothing you can't get better at. Now is the time to build your roots, and the broader and deeper they run, the richer your life will be and the more luck you will have.

get a ****** degree (I'm 27)

She's just not that important.

Quit smoking.

Buy all the tech stocks you can afford.

Sell them in March 2000.

Take chances but don't be so sure you got it all figured out.

Love the list DC and chopstick. Sums it up good

Does the 25 year old me know the advice is coming from himself in the future?

get a life :|

+1

/thread

Its odd that no one said take advantage of the poker boom.

A lot of contrary advice here:
-Some people say to focus on your career, others say to focus more on personal life.
-Some people say to focus more on relationships/girls, others say they are not as important.

say no to drugs.
... and say yes to fat girls with mega rich parents.

- invest in real estate to be held for long term
- max 401k, IRA every year
- find something you enjoy and own the business in that field
- spend wisely on daily living (didn't say cheap)
- it is easier to take risk at a younger age then older - if you are mature person, take a shot.

golf is a great benefit in business, learn the game.

You've said no to fat girls w/ mega rich parents on more than one occasion?

I think this is very interesting, as those values must be very preferential and is neither right/wrong.

Considering, it's advice you'd give to you, the personal aspect that is shared is very appreciated. Thank you

I'm surprised none of you said to not get married :P

That's because marriage is going to be one of the best things you end up doing in your life, and vast majority of people find having kids to be one of the most rewarding things of their lives.

Your 20s friends are going to disappear from your daily picture as you grow older. They will get married and their life priorities will change. All the sudden, they start to hang out with other married couples and other couples with kids instead of hanging out with you. Very few social circles stay the same during your 30s the way they did in your 20s.

People often find various excuses of how marriage or kids stopped them from traveling, pursuing certain interests, or developing something. But in most of those cases, those people weren't doing those things even when they were single and this is just their internal justification. When you have two people who are both on the same page, it is usually easier to do these things, not harder.

This is assuming you choose wisely.

There's a lot of bitter people who made the wrong choice and they are pretty loud about it.

Most of them. My assessment is 25% of all couples get to be happy like love-happy no pretending for other or deluding themselves or whatnot.*

*have small sample tho