101 Timeless Lessons Life Teaches

Take everything you’ve ever learned – all the crazy experiences

and lessons – and place it all in a box labeled “Thank you.”

What has life taught you?  Think about all the things you would love to tell yourself if you could travel back in time to give your younger self some advice about life.

This is what our sister site, Everyday Life Lessons, is all about.  Here’s a fresh sample of our favorite life lessons that were recently published on the site:

1. What you do today is important because you are exchanging a day of your life for it.
2. In life, you usually get what you ask for, but it rarely comes in the package you think it’s supposed to come in.
3. Never let one bad day make you feel like you have a bad life.
4. Just because today is a terrible day doesn’t mean tomorrow won’t be the best day of your life.  You just got to get there.
5. Tell the truth, or eventually someone will tell it for you.  Read The Four Agreements.
6. A mistake is an accident.  Cheating and lying are not mistakes.  They are intentional choices.
7. Sometimes the person you want most is the person you’re better off without.
8. Some people cannot stand that you’re moving on with your life, and so they will try to drag your past to catch up with you.  Do not help them by acknowledging their behavior.  Keep moving forward.
9. Surround yourself with positive people who are going to push you toward greatness.  Eliminate those who are trying to keep you from it.
10. Don’t let something that doesn’t matter cause you to lose something thatdoes.
11. Sometimes people aren’t who they seem to be, and sometimes people are so much more than you originally thought.
12. Loving someone isn’t just about saying it every day, it’s showing it every day in every way.
13. Maturity is not when we start speaking about big things, it’s when we start understanding the small things.
14. Of all the things that can be stolen from you – your possessions, your youth, your health, your words, your rights – what no one can ever take from you is your freedom to choose what you will believe in, and who and what your heart will love.
15. When you can forgive yourself and others and stop the imprisonment, you’re creating the love of your life.
16. Not forgiving is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.
17. Age wrinkles the body.  Quitting on your dreams wrinkles the soul.
18. The past can’t hurt you anymore – not unless you let it.
19. Holding on to the unchangeable past is a waste of energy, and serves no purpose in creating a better future.
20. Sometimes you’ve got to emotionally let go of the things that once meant a lot to you, so you can move beyond the past and the pain it brings you, and open the next chapter in your life.
21. The path to our destination is not always a straight one.  We go down the wrong one, we get lost, and we turn back.  But maybe it doesn’t matter which road we embark on.  Maybe what matters is that we embark.
22. It doesn’t matter if you’ve failed or if you’ve been beaten.  All that matters is that you learn something, get back up, and try again.  Because winning is a good feeling, but winning when nobody else thought you could is an awesome feeling.
23. Knowing yourself is one thing, but truly believing and living as yourself is another.  With so much social conditioning in our society, we sometimes forget who we are.
24. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.
25. You can grow stronger from the pain if you don’t let it destroy you.
26. Tell the negativity committee that meets inside your head to sit down and shut up.
27. The worst person to be around is the one who complains about everything and appreciates nothing.  Avoid these people at all costs.
28. Live in such a way that if someone decided to speak badly of you, no one would believe it.
29. If you love someone, tell them.  For hearts are often broken by words left unspoken.
30. Life is shorter than it often seems.  Sometimes we are only given a few minutes to be with the ones we love, and hundreds of hours to spend thinking of them.  Cherish the moments you have with your friends and family, because in one single second they can be taken away from you forever.
31. Things change, but the sun always rises the next day.  The bad news: nothing is permanent.  The good news: nothing is permanent.
32. It’s your road, and yours alone.  Others may walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you.
33. We often accept the love we think we deserve.
34. If someone can’t accept you at your worst, they don’t deserve you at your best.
35. Without communication there is no relationship; without respect there is no love; without trust there’s no reason to continue.
36. If you leave someone at least tell them why, because knowing you’re not worth an explanation is even more painful than being abandoned.
37. Speak when you are very angry, and you’ll make the best speech you’ll ever regret.
38. Choose your words carefully – they can’t be taken back once you give them away.  Harsh words are like bullets – they can leave deep wounds.  And most of the time saying “sorry” is not enough to heal the wounds you leave.
39. Never make a big decision when you’re angry, and never make a big promise when you’re overjoyed.
40. It makes no sense to be second in someone’s life when you know you’re good enough to be first in someone else’s.