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-   -   What advice would your 50+ self... (https://www.bikeforums.net/fifty-plus-50/344198-what-advice-would-your-50-self.html)

Digital Gee 09-16-07 09:15 AM

What advice would your 50+ self...
 
...have given your 20-something self, had that been possible? In other words, what do you wish you'd known then that you know now?

(And would you have listened?)

BSLeVan 09-16-07 09:25 AM

Time is not to be wasted. Each day is a precious gift. Treat them as such.

cranky old dude 09-16-07 09:27 AM

I have often wished that I'ld had the foresight to buy up a bunch
of old Lionel and Marx Trains back in the 70's when they were dirt
cheap. I pay through the nose for that old stuff now.

Of course I was too busy Drinkin' and Skiing and messing around with
the MG's to have done that. Foolish me, I thunk my toy train days was
behind me. :o

will dehne 09-16-07 09:36 AM

I do remember that time. I always suffered from information overload. So much well meaning advise and even more self serving advise so that you finaly just go on living.
Following role models worked better for me. (It had it's up and down also)

BluesDawg 09-16-07 09:39 AM

Stop partying so much and study more. You are in this for a lot longer than you think, so take that into account in the choices you are making. Don't get a job, learn to get paid for doing the things you love to do. Do not marry (first wife)!

Retro Grouch 09-16-07 10:03 AM

Bet your ass this too will pass.

Chaco 09-16-07 10:23 AM

You know, I did a lot of incredibly stupid things when I was in my 20's. But I don't really regret them. And I did some smart things too - like meeting my wife 33 years ago when I was in my 20's. I would be a much different person, and probably a much more boring one, if I hadn't made a bunch of huge mistakes back then that I learned a lot from.

swan652 09-16-07 11:07 AM

I could fill volumes with advise to a younger me. Would I have listened? Not a chance.

terry b 09-16-07 12:43 PM

Buy as many shares of Microsoft as you can afford. If you can't afford very many, borrow some money and buy some more.

That and don't waste your time being angry at the world. Also don't marry that woman you're going to meet in 1975. And drop that stupid major and go into engineering.

dorosz 09-16-07 01:28 PM

MOst of the people you care about will be dead before your 50 take more pictures treasure the time with them more talk to them about who they are and how they got there you won't ever get another chance.

Terrierman 09-16-07 01:35 PM

Don't marry that one, and get an MBA. And I might have, who knows, sometimes I actually listen to me now. The don't marry that one is turning into a theme!

Wildwood 09-16-07 05:57 PM

I worked at Intel in the 70s before the microprocessor; should have stayed even if it meant becoming a janitor, but NOOOO I had to get an MBA and moveon to better things. Turned down a job offer with a little start-up called Cisco, I mean really....trying to hook up all the world's computers on some international network that didn't even hardly exist was such a STUPID idea. I won't even list some of my other great choices.

Who can grant me the power of hindsight, it's not too late.

Let me make a few different decisions and life would be so much more luxurious.

Retro Grouch 09-16-07 06:02 PM


Originally Posted by Wildwood (Post 5279850)
I worked at Intel in the 70s before the microprocessor; should have stayed even if it meant becoming a janitor, but NOOOO I had to get an MBA and moveon to better things. Turned down a job offer with a little start-up called Cisco, I mean really....trying to hook up all the world's computers on some international network that didn't even hardly exist was such a STUPID idea. I won't even list some of my other great choices.

I've heard that story before. When my brother-in-law was a graduate student at K-State a couple of friends approached him to invest in their restaurant venture. He had the money but they wanted him to work in the restaurant too and he felt getting his masters degree in economics was more important. The restaurant was the first Pizza Hut.

zonatandem 09-16-07 06:04 PM

Advice:"Do what you want to do . . ."
Would I have listened? Yup, I did!

Beverly 09-16-07 06:06 PM


Originally Posted by Terrierman (Post 5278863)
The don't marry that one is turning into a theme!

Don't marry any of them.......

Artkansas 09-16-07 06:23 PM


Originally Posted by Digital Gee (Post 5278137)
...have given your 20-something self, had that been possible? In other words, what do you wish you'd known then that you know now?

(And would you have listened?)

To not leave my job at Information International to go back and get my degree. (I tried to get into their 3D department for 2 years and finally left to get my BA at UC Santa Barbara. Six months after I left, they got the contract to do major parts of "Tron". They would have needed me, and my entire career would have been different.

My mistake was to go from where the action was to where the action was studied. I probably would have listened. Instead, I went with traditional advice and I listened to a dream I had during a week long bout of flu. In the dream, I was back in Santa Barbara and late for class. It had truth. I seized the opportunity and found opportunties at school that were gone by the time I graduated. But I would have been better off staying at Triple I.

TruF 09-16-07 06:52 PM

Wait until rational thought and sense of self is more powerful than hormones before experimenting with the opposite sex. Have higher expectations for self and others. +100 Don't marry the first one; not fair to so many people even if no kids. Travel. Take risks; don't settle for security. Before getting married, read Dr. Laura's books before taking any vows. Dr. Laura may be obnoxious on the radio at times, but her book about the care and feeding of husbands saved my second (and hopefully last) marriage. Being a child of divorce, seeing nothing but failed marriages growing up, and coming of age during the women's movement, I had no role models for developing and maintaining a strong marriage. It was a nice surprise to find out how easy (and fun) it was to turn an unhappily married man into a happy one and create a flourishing marriage. Then we read her book about what both the husband and wife need in a marriage, and it made things even better. And ride bikes!

tobycat 09-16-07 07:27 PM

Forget the girl; Take the job with Goldman Sachs!

Red Rider 09-16-07 07:29 PM


Originally Posted by swan652 (Post 5278469)
I could fill volumes with advise to a younger me. Would I have listened? Not a chance.

+1 on the volumes of advice. +1,000 on the not-listening.

ticwanos 09-16-07 07:31 PM


Originally Posted by Monoborracho (Post 5279921)
Be very conservative when you make your first million $, because its harder to hang on to than it is to make it.

********************?? Make the first one? Right.

Big Paulie 09-16-07 08:14 PM

I ignored the advice of older adults when I was in my mid-20's, and left a high paying job in a field I liked, solely because I was creeped out by my co-workers. For years I regretted making that "mistake," as I never found a job nearly as well paying or as well suited to my temperment. I was sure the advice that the older folks had given me was right, and my feeling about the people I worked with were wrong.

Since that time, and we're talking over 30 years ago, the people I worked with at that job have all either died of drug and alcohol abuse, committed suicide, or ended up in prison. Every effin' one of them. Finally, in my mid-50's I can honestly say I made the right choice to leave that job.

Sometimes learned advice is trumped by how you feel inside...even if you are a young person.

Tom Bombadil 09-16-07 08:16 PM

In all seriousness ... Stop after having THREE children!

We have five children.

bobby c 09-16-07 08:36 PM

Compound interest....

Tom Bombadil 09-16-07 08:50 PM

There will be a couple of guys who start building bicycles in a barn in Wisconsin in the late 1970s. Go meet them, befriend them, and get involved with their little startup company.

Neil_B 09-16-07 09:13 PM


Originally Posted by Digital Gee (Post 5278137)
...have given your 20-something self, had that been possible? In other words, what do you wish you'd known then that you know now?

(And would you have listened?)

I would have told me, "lose weight and exercise. In 20 years you will be 385 pounds and unable to walk a city block without resting. The structural problems you are beginning to experience now will only get worse with extra weight on you. Your cholesterol count will be through the roof, you will be sluggish, have sickly-looking skin, and will spend a night in a cardiac unit because you might have had a heart attack. Buy a bike."

And no, the 26o pound me would not have listened.

Neil, who weighs less than he did in high school.


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