More life advice from an engineer
3 min readMar 9, 2023
Continued from
- Be yourself, but be the best version of yourself. Always improve yourself, but don’t try to become someone you are not, you’ll be miserable.
- Be different, but don’t stand out too much from the crowd. The loudest crow often gets shot first.
- Be your best self, for yourself. There is no need to impress anyone else.
- Think independently, but be open-minded. Be willing to listen to other ideas before formulating your own.
- Rules and traditions are meant to be broken. But don’t pointlessly break them, they are there for a reason.
- Time is your most valuable resource. Make the best use of it. It’s ok to trade money for time, but do not trade time for money.
- What is popular isn’t always right. Think rationally, and don’t blindly follow the crowd and subscribe to herd mentality.
- Know your place in the world. Be realistic with your expectations and what you’re capable of.
- Dream big, but expect little. High expectations always lead to disappointment.
- Freedom is not free. You have to earn it and respect it. Many people died fighting for it.
- Those who cannot discipline themselves will be disciplined. You become a slave to your masters and your vices.
- Love yourself before you love someone else. The only guarantee in life is you — others come and go. Take care of your needs first before others.
- Surround yourself with the type of people you want to become. Everyone is the average of the five people closest to them.
- Life is a never-ending quest to learn. Learn everything you can, you never know when you’ll need it.
- All learning is empty until you use it. Don’t just read, apply your learnings and put them into practice.
- You can only master three of the following at any given time: career/academics, health, family, social life, and fun/travel. Choose wisely.
- Rather than thinking about how to divide the cake further, think instead about how to make the cake bigger.
- If a problem can be solved using money, then it’s not a real problem. Money cannot buy your life back.
- There’s always more that you don’t know than what you know. You can’t know everything. Learn how to deal with not knowing.
- You don’t have as much (time, money, etc.) as you think. Before you know it you’ll be old or broke and regretting.
- Always being busy is a sign of laziness. You’re simply working to distract yourself from the real problems.
- There is no such thing as an accident. Only stupidity, carelessness, and unpreparedness.
- Speak the truth, but with a filter. Otherwise, you’ll be seen as an outcast.
- Trust your gut. If something doesn’t feel right, bail.
- Enjoy your solitude. Everyone has their own lives once you’re out of school. Being alone does not equate to loneliness.
- You cannot push on a rope or pull on dirt. Follow the rules of nature.
- Be in one with nature. Love it or hate it, we are all part of it. Never work against the forces of nature.
- Live for the experiences. Things can be easily broken, lost, and replaced, but memories last a lifetime.
- True happiness and satisfaction come from within. Everything you experience on the outside is merely stimulation.
- You’re lucky to be alive. Carry yourself with a purpose, and live every day as if it’s your last.