There's not a lot I would do differently, I started out pretty young and went pretty hard pretty early. Initially I never traveled, but then by my mid 20s that caught up with me and I addressed that traveling the major parts of the world by age 31 and lived OS for 18 mths which was just amazing while my property was ticking over nicely back home in the background.
The biggest thing I would say is to probably listen to my gut more and have more faith in myself earlier on. I am different to many of the people who I worked with for many years, a lot more driven. I was told repeatedly by lazy coworkers that I wouldn't be able to go out on my own, work from home etc, because I would get distracted by the TV and it would be "risky" and all this crap. What they meant was "they couldn't" yet amazingly they force it down my throat telling me *I* couldn't. Well proved that all wrong, and I end up thriving working out on my own and have never looked back. But what a scary move it was to take at the time, I was filled with fear, but just knew in my gut I wasn't happy previously with the way things were going. Then one things leads to another and the best single move I have made in my life. I knew I had more to offer and I knew I was good at my job and had a passion for it, but being in the corporate mouse wheel was not the right "structure" or "mechanism" for me to effectively put my wheels into motion. I was too constrained and bogged down by the Joe Average plodder who was just clocking on and off and slowing me down. People with no drive or ambition who talk about the footy all day or evil people who try to knock you down aka tall poppy syndrome.
if your gut tells you that you are different and that you have more to offer and you can picture yourself doing things a little differently, then push through the fear and just say stuff it and give it a red hot go and 100% back yourself. As someone else said in another post, once you push through the fear, that is truly where the fun starts and life begins to get truly exciting.
I have had a couple of random sickness things flare up out of nowhere, hopefully not permanent, and I am a very healthy/fit person who eats extremely well. But I realise just how much you have to live life for "now" as you may do all this fantastic saving and money making and not even be here at 70 to live off it. So life definitely has to be a balance between lifestyle/convenience and future wealth generation. I've learnt that lesson now and apply it to daily life. I will never starve myself again just for future wealth generation purposes.
Other lessons are probably yes sure expect a helluva lot from your partner/girlfriend but also don't push your girl to her limits and break her from too much pressure to perform. I have had some very caring and wonderfully giving girlfriends, but as I am very driven I have very high expectations and I know I have a bad habit of subtly hinting at them to always work harder and try harder at work etc financially. It would kind of annoy me to meet girls in their mid 20s who don't have anything behind them, you meet them and they don't have their own home and they have a $15k car loan and a $5k credit card debt. You basically inherit their financial woes. When I'd tried so hard since day one to be the opposite of that, it does come as a disappointment for some reason to meet someone like that. But they are good people with wonderful hearts. So I help them out and educate them to get themselves out of debt. And they do appreciate it and feel better off afterwards. Not all girls/girlfriends had fantastic father role model figures in their lives and I honestly reckon it makes a big difference. They don't always learn all of these things if their family broke apart early on in the piece, but as long as they are willing to learn with an open mind then hey that's great.
So when I look back in hindsight, they were usually doing everything for me and going out of their way. I appreciate that now and it has improved who I am now and how I appreciate my current partner and what she does for me. Not everyone is as driven as me and I have to accept that and not be so harsh on people for being human. You can't ask for much more than to have a fully supportive, loving partner who is there with your through all the risk taking and happy to come to the other side of the world with you at the drop of a hat, supporting, organising, cooking and coordinating things all the way through all the ups and downs.
The amazing thing is that the longer you are together, the more you start thinking alike and in parallel and everything more and more becomes a team system that just works.
The biggest thing I would say is to probably listen to my gut more and have more faith in myself earlier on. I am different to many of the people who I worked with for many years, a lot more driven. I was told repeatedly by lazy coworkers that I wouldn't be able to go out on my own, work from home etc, because I would get distracted by the TV and it would be "risky" and all this crap. What they meant was "they couldn't" yet amazingly they force it down my throat telling me *I* couldn't. Well proved that all wrong, and I end up thriving working out on my own and have never looked back. But what a scary move it was to take at the time, I was filled with fear, but just knew in my gut I wasn't happy previously with the way things were going. Then one things leads to another and the best single move I have made in my life. I knew I had more to offer and I knew I was good at my job and had a passion for it, but being in the corporate mouse wheel was not the right "structure" or "mechanism" for me to effectively put my wheels into motion. I was too constrained and bogged down by the Joe Average plodder who was just clocking on and off and slowing me down. People with no drive or ambition who talk about the footy all day or evil people who try to knock you down aka tall poppy syndrome.
if your gut tells you that you are different and that you have more to offer and you can picture yourself doing things a little differently, then push through the fear and just say stuff it and give it a red hot go and 100% back yourself. As someone else said in another post, once you push through the fear, that is truly where the fun starts and life begins to get truly exciting.
I have had a couple of random sickness things flare up out of nowhere, hopefully not permanent, and I am a very healthy/fit person who eats extremely well. But I realise just how much you have to live life for "now" as you may do all this fantastic saving and money making and not even be here at 70 to live off it. So life definitely has to be a balance between lifestyle/convenience and future wealth generation. I've learnt that lesson now and apply it to daily life. I will never starve myself again just for future wealth generation purposes.
Other lessons are probably yes sure expect a helluva lot from your partner/girlfriend but also don't push your girl to her limits and break her from too much pressure to perform. I have had some very caring and wonderfully giving girlfriends, but as I am very driven I have very high expectations and I know I have a bad habit of subtly hinting at them to always work harder and try harder at work etc financially. It would kind of annoy me to meet girls in their mid 20s who don't have anything behind them, you meet them and they don't have their own home and they have a $15k car loan and a $5k credit card debt. You basically inherit their financial woes. When I'd tried so hard since day one to be the opposite of that, it does come as a disappointment for some reason to meet someone like that. But they are good people with wonderful hearts. So I help them out and educate them to get themselves out of debt. And they do appreciate it and feel better off afterwards. Not all girls/girlfriends had fantastic father role model figures in their lives and I honestly reckon it makes a big difference. They don't always learn all of these things if their family broke apart early on in the piece, but as long as they are willing to learn with an open mind then hey that's great.
So when I look back in hindsight, they were usually doing everything for me and going out of their way. I appreciate that now and it has improved who I am now and how I appreciate my current partner and what she does for me. Not everyone is as driven as me and I have to accept that and not be so harsh on people for being human. You can't ask for much more than to have a fully supportive, loving partner who is there with your through all the risk taking and happy to come to the other side of the world with you at the drop of a hat, supporting, organising, cooking and coordinating things all the way through all the ups and downs.
The amazing thing is that the longer you are together, the more you start thinking alike and in parallel and everything more and more becomes a team system that just works.
