Everyone regrets some life choices. As the saying goes, “you live, you learn.” A study published in The Journal of Social Psychology looked into what advice people would give their younger selves.
Several hundred volunteers over the age of 30 were surveyed. The results give us a little insight into five areas of life people wish they could have improved:
• Money (Save more money, younger me!)
• Relationships (Don't marry that money grabber! Find a nice guy to settle down with.)
• Education (Finish school. Don't study business because people tell you to, you'll hate it.)
• A sense of self (Do what you want to do. Never mind what others think.)
• Life goals (Never give up. Set goals. Travel more.)
Words of wisdom those surveyed passed along include:
• "Money is a social trap."
• "What you do twice becomes a habit; be careful of what habits you form."
• "I would say do not ever base any decisions on fear."
According to the authors of the study, Robin Kowalski and Annie McCord, the results suggest “that there is much to be learned that can facilitate well-being and bring us more in line with the person that we would like to be should we follow that advice."
The study also asked if the participants have started following the advice they wish they could have given themselves. 65.7% of them said "yes" and that doing so had helped them become the person they want to be rather than what society tells them they should be. So perhaps it isn't too late for everybody to start taking their own advice.