As Albert Einstein mentioned long time ago, a calm and modest life is the best life.
An young adult’s life will be good, if these points are kept in mind. These are excerpted from the book “Life Know-How: A Life Guide with Sensible Advice to Live Life to the Fullest” that I published recently.
1. Engage in social interactions with everyone around you. This includes having conversations with the barber, milkman, grocery shop clerk, postman, neighbours, etc. It has been scientifically proven that this enhances mental health and also helps you live longer.
2. Maintain close relationships with family and friends. Take their help as required when you need advice or when you are in a bad situation. Keep in mind that friendship is not a one way street. So, you should also help your friends when they need you.
3. Be kind to yourself. You should love and accept yourself the way you are. Don’t judge yourself in a bad way and create your own misery. Swap any negative thoughts with positive ones.
4. Perform daily exercise for 30 minutes to an hour. Plan your day so that you get 7 to 8 hours of sleep every night, which is imperative to stay healthy. Avoid eating junk foods and eat wholesome foods instead.
5. Stay focused on the present and don’t worry about past or future. Do not let negative things from the past effect your present-day happiness. Whatever occurred in the past cannot be altered and you should let it go and move on.
6. For making big decisions in life, the time spent on deciding should be relative to the importance of the decision. It is good to have as much data as you can before you decide. List the pros and cons of each option related to a decision. This will allow you to see the complete picture and help you arrive at a good decision.
7. Everyone in the world has made mistakes one time or another. Admit and take responsibility for your mistake when it happens. Find out the reasons, learn from it, and create a plan to not make the same mistake again.
8. Negative experiences and emotions are part of human experience. It is good to accept them and learn from them. You may not have control over a bad situation, but you can adopt a positive mental attitude to overcome the negative.
9. Don’t compare yourself with those who are richer than you and become hopeless. Instead make a downward comparison and be thankful for what you have. Practice gratitude on a daily basis.
10. You need to work on personal development and also learn continuously throughout life.
11. Watch your thoughts. Unguarded and distorted thoughts cause harm to you. Examples of distorted thoughts include overstating the consequences of something, predicting something bad happening without any evidence, taking an isolated thing and applying it broadly, etc. You should question these thoughts and replace them with new thoughts.
12. We create mental models of the world through which we experience life. This model includes beliefs we have formed. It is good to alter these beliefs when there is evidence to the contrary.
13. Emotional fitness is as important as physical fitness in life. You need to cope with negative emotions in a smart way. Have faith in yourself, step up to the task, and never give up.
14. You need to take responsibility to manage your health, money, relationships, and happiness throughout life. You should not delegate them to anyone.
15. Surround yourself with good people. They will help you succeed in life.
16. There is battle between vices and virtues in everyone’s life. Many vices such as lust, gluttony, greed, envy, etc. lead to short-term pleasures. Virtues such as chastity, temperance, charity, kindness, etc. lead to long-term happiness. You should resist the temptation of vices and seek lifelong happiness.
17. Attitudes like indifference, indecision, being over-cautious, procrastinating, worrying too much, etc. prevent you in making progress in life. Take action to move forward in life.
18. Self-discipline leads you to happiness. Set yourself a goal to become more disciplined.
19. Don’t die without doing what inspires you in life. Do it irrespective of the opinion of others.
20. Believe that you can overcome all life’s challenges.