Life lessons 101: my experiences before I reached 30

It’s Cassarica Nadas’ birthday. She is the chief executive officer of The Blog Tag community and her site Amazeblog. This lady is my homie and part of my Mastermind Group – we share ideas and experiences relating to our blogs. Hip hip HOORAY honey!

So in light of your birthday I thought of sharing some lessons I have learnt in my 29 years on earth.

I love how talk show host Oprah Winfrey says that author Maya Angelou taught her this:

“When you know better, you do better.” This means, if you mature then you will make better decisions. Yessss!

The movie “Confessions of a Shopaholic” is one of my favourites to watch. Besides the fact that it taught me I should wear more bright [sometimes neon] and brave colours like pink, I loved how the parents of this shopaholic did the following:
After finding out their daughter is in huge debt, the parents sold their huge car that they wanted to tour with. Before talking to their daughter about financially helping her out, the mom holds out a book “Ways to financially equip your child” to the dad and asks if it’s too late. The dad says “No, it’s never too late.”

Lesson: It’s never too late to do anything.

Another favourite romantic comedy is “John Tucker Must Die”. So John has a lot of girlfriends in his school, because he is Mister Popular. The girls find out about each other and try to trick John. The problem is whenever something goes wrong, John uses it to his advantage JUST BECAUSE HE CAN. He gets embarrassed, but he owns the embarrassment and whatever he does, becomes a trend.
For instance, the girl he likes tells him to wear a girl’s thong (thin panty) and boys in the school sees him wearing this.
Because he owns the good and the bad (in this instance the embarrassment), the other boys in school start wearing panties (that’s showing) too.

Lesson: No matter what bad happens, own it. Use it to your advantage.

Okay enough movie lessons 🙂

My mother taught me that I shouldn’t buy on credit. I did eventually after getting married. Shame on me. But I have learned to stay away from credit of retail and food. Though it helps to buy on credit when you are broke, try to stay away from buying on credit. Los die gedagte (leave those thoughts) if you can do without it (buying on credit I mean).

Another thing I learned: if you do buy on credit, try to pay a month’s installment ahead. It helps to pay off the debt quicker.

To avoid a bad credit record – if you cannot seem to pay your debt, pay a little money on the debt every month. No matter how small the amount is.

Moving away from debt…

Before renting at a place, make sure that the owner is not going to revamp his house. I thought it was okay to live at a cottage where the owner was renovating her house. BIG MISTAKE!
There were too much dust, noise, and no parking for my car during the day.

Always read through a contract and if you don’t understand, ask questions. I almost paid three months rent in advance for a new place – this is if I had not asked about it.

LIFE LESSONS

It’s okay if you lose friends – some people are there only for a season in your life (or their life). Even if you were besties and that person suddenly gives up on you – just let it be.

Hard work pays off. When I started working as a junior – or if I am new in a job, I try to be at work an hour earlier so that I can prep for the day, hunt for stories, et cetera. It helps. Eventually I got better and did things in less time.

It’s okay if your interests change. I love journalism, but that does not mean I will do this forever. My father worked at a railway company, thereafter he became an entrepreneur, after that he worked as an administrator at a school, and now he is a professional teacher. I also have a friend who was a teacher for 20 years and she recently started doing her articles for lawyer. She is now a Legal Aid lawyer.

Give – and/ or lend without expecting it back. Even if people tell you they’ll pay you back, don’t wait for that payback. Write it off. If you do wait for it and they don’t pay you back, you will scar relationships.

It’s okay to say “no”.

Well, that is some of the lessons I have learned. I hope you can learn from some of my mistakes.

As part of Sam Posselt‘s 7-Day #rsabizblogs Challenge, I will leave you Oprah’s lesson learnt:

What life lessons would you give someone younger than yourself? Thank you for reading!