A common question, indeed - "I don't know what I'm doing with my life, can you advise something?"

Well, perhaps I can. I got a nice email from a reader, and I wrote a long reply. If you're in a hurry, skim down to "Okay. So here’s my thoughts" which is where the pragmatic guidelines start - I'll bold it so you can start there, if you like.

Hi Sebastian,

First, I'd like to say that I've really enjoyed reading your blog. It has so much insightful and enlightening material that I've gone back to reread and try to really absorb some of the ideas you have. I've been meaning to contact you but I felt a bit intimidated, to be honest. I'd really like to hear your advice.

I'm about a year removed from high school, attending community college and I've just been floating around, doing general education courses and I've yet to really decide on a major. I don't really have any particular talents or strong interests in one field or another.

How did you spend your formative years? Did you know what you wanted to do or had a plan in place already? I know the old adage is to follow your passions but how do you turn that into a means of sustenance? If you're reading this, I really thank you for taking the time to hear me out.

Sincerely,
J

Hey J,

Good to hear from you. Replies in line -

Hi Sebastian,

First, I'd like to say that I've really enjoyed reading your blog. It has so much insightful and enlightening material that I've gone back to reread and try to really absorb some of the ideas you have.

Thank you, great, I appreciate that.

I've been meaning to contact you but I felt a bit intimidated, to be honest.

Strange, isn't it? I feel that way too sometimes, before reaching out to somebody. It's irrational though, isn't it? I mean, if I don't write back... so what? What did you lose? 10 minutes of your life?

But the upside is... a lot higher? I think about this sometimes. Fear in this sense doesn't do good things for us.

I'd really like to hear your advice.

I'm about a year removed from high school, attending community college and I've just been floating around, doing general education courses and I've yet to really decide on a major. I don't really have any particular talents or strong interests in one field or another.

How did you spend your formative years?

Well, my path is kind of a crazy one that goes all over the place. I left home at 16 and just scrapped and struggled and survived for a while, eventually wound up going to university, then dropped out to take up entrepreneurship, struggled mightily at it for a year or two before breaking through, and then it's been a mix of highs and lows since then. Not anything resembling a normal path.

Which brings us to the next point -

Did you know what you wanted to do or had a plan in place already?

Nope, I barely figured out my calling in the last year or two. All I knew before that was what I didn't want, which is what normal people have. I looked at the normal person's life and was horrified, and wanted nothing to do with it.

What I did want, though, I didn't know... I mean, the non-mainstream path isn't so well-illuminated. There's not so much advice on how to walk it.

I know the old adage is to follow your passions but how do you turn that into a means of sustenance.

I think following your passions is overrated to some extent. I mean, yes, follow your passions, but it's not a magical solution to all problems. There's this general advice that, "Follow your passions and things work out" and I'm just not sure it's true. Yes, follow your passions, but also do other things right.

If you're reading this, I really thank you for taking the time to hear me out.

Okay. So here's my thoughts.

When I was younger, I knew I didn't want a normal life, but I didn't know what I did want.

I thought about it, and I decided I'd start building skills, resources, experiences, and mobility. I figured that I'd eventually figure out what I wanted, and then older me would be happy that younger me got cash and skills and resources and contacts.

There's not so much detail in your email for me to give precise advice, but I think all of the following are useful to more or less extent:

*Starting to study and develop your own ethical system
*Making good friends, advisors, and mentors who are strong and decent people
*Learning universally useful skills
*A few credentials
*Putting money in the bank
*Getting your credit up
*Studying history to learn what's possible
*Establishing good habits that'll carry you through life
*Becoming very fit and healthy
*Learning how to think

...and so on.

So here's some things I'd recommend, in no particular order:

*Get the book "Musashi" by Eiji Yoshikawa. This is one of my favorite books, and it should help you develop some of your ethical system and learn about how to channel raw potential. It's also a really good and fun read.

*Read the sequences on LessWrong - Go to http://www.lesswrong.com, click sequences, read almost all of them. These will teach you how to think better.

*Go to Wikipedia once a week, and put in a historical leader or era of history, and start reading. I like Sengoku Japan, and think Hideyoshi Toyotomi and Ieyasu Tokugawa are good people to study. I like Rome and Britain too. Renaissance Italy is good. The founding of America is good. Shah Jahan, Saladin, the Prophet Muhammad, all good. Zhuge Liang and Sun Tzu, good. The Meiji Restoration in Japan. The Teutonic Knights, founding of Prussia, and how it became a warlike country. Napoleon Bonaparte and the Duke of Wellington. John Rockefeller, Cosimo Medici, Lorenzo Medici, Meyer Rothschild, all good to study. There's lots more, too. Don't get overwhelmed by this list, just occasionally plug a name or era into Wikipedia, and start learning. You don't know what's possible unless you study history. Also, I mostly gave you statesmen and businessmen, there's lots of people from other fields worth learning about too (though you probably shouldn't emulate "pure artists" - people who do art in addition to other things, like Thomas Jefferson, tend to do well. But pure artists often have miserably bad lives, so you don't want to start by emulating pure artists... it's not worth it)

*If you're taking general university courses, take accounting. It's really useful, but it's too boring to self-study. It's probably the course most suited to the current university system of all of them. Take accounting.

*Start learning general social skills. I recommend you read "How to Win Friends and Influence People" - but don't read it cover to cover. Instead, read one chapter per week, and then practice the ideas from it. That's what I did, and I saw massive increases from that.

*Learn how to negotiate. Read 4-5 books on negotiation. I think "Critical Conversations" is probably the best one to start with. Get comfortable haggling, but realize that good negotiation far transcends haggling.

*Oh, here's a pragmatic note. You're American, yes? Okay, do you have a credit score? If not, here's the easiest way to get one. Go to your bank, put a small amount of money in a certificate of deposit, and get a secured loan against it that pays off automatically. Basically, the CD will pay you 2% interest or whatever, and the secured loan will cost 3% interest... so if you put $1,000 into the CD, you lose $10 to do this, but it massively increases your credit score (it's automatic payment of revolving credit, which is good for a few reasons - I won't get into the exact details, just trust me and do it). You can do it with as low as $100 I reckon, I did it with a $1000 and it was good. After a few months of this, you'll have an established credit history. I'd recommend you apply for the Amazon credit card, which gives a big discount on books, so you can get $50 of free books or something. Then you get points which you can use for more free books later. Much later on, when you have higher spending, you'll probably want an AMEX gold card, but secured loan + Amazon credit card is probably enough for now. Do this ASAP, I lost a lot of money once when I couldn't get a mortgage on a very good buy because I didn't have a credit history. Trust me on this. By the time you start thinking of needing credit, it's too late to build it. Do it now.

*Never, ever, ever get into debt. Just don't do it. If you have debt (student loans, credit cars, etc), pay them off as soon as you have any cash at all. Debt is okay for a mortgage on a house, and that's about it. I think education debt is a bad idea personally, and that universities exploit young people who don't understand the value of money yet, but I'm in the minority on that. Maybe take university debt if you need to, but much better to save and pay cash if possible. If you take on debt, absolutely no buying toys or partying with your money until your debt is paid off. Debt cripples a man's ability to do what he wants with his life. Stay away from it at all costs.

*Train yourself to do arithmetic fast. There's more value in being able to add, subtract, divide, and do percents fast than in any other kind of math. Whenever you see numbers, try to do them in your head before using your calculator. It sucks, but it's very useful when you're doing a business deal or shopping and it'd be out of place to pull a calculator out. You really want to be able to do relatively large numbers fast in your head... when you see food for sale, divide the price by the weight to see the cost per unit of larger and small containers. Stuff like that. It sucks at first, but then it becomes second nature. This is very useful.

*You'll never go wrong learning programming or any other kind of technology.

*Learn to type fast. There's many, many games that teach you how to type fast - you can get ones that explicit train you how to type fast, or games where you input complex commands by typing. This will serve you well, you're going to spend lots of time typing in your life. You have to know how to touch-type without looking at your hands.

*Consider taking up a martial art. We had a thread on the site recently with feedback about which is best, you can refer to that. I still recommend Krav Maga, but there's lots of good discussion and feedback on other arts.

*Go to the bodybuilding.com forums, and start reading everything about nutrition and training. Don't bother with supplements for now, supplements don't do very much unless you've got the fundamentals down. Study the sections on losing fat and building muscle, so you understand how to do it. Gradually improve your physique. Every morning, I stretch and do situps. I usually take a long walk, swim, hike, or lift weights 3-4 times per week, and sometimes every day. The time it takes to exercise is more than made up by needing to sleep less, having higher energy, and thinking more clearly.

*If you try to become excellent, normal people will judge you. Fuck them. Seriously, I said it and I meant it. Fuck 'em. I gradually quit drugs, drinking, tobacco, refined my diet, quit sugar, etc, etc. - every time I heard discouragement and crap from people. Fuck them. When I dropped out of high school, I heard discouragement and crap from people. When I dropped out of university to start building a company, I heard discouragement and crap. When I started traveling, I heard warnings and discouragement and crap. If you try to be excellent, you're going to constantly be hearing warnings and discouragement and crap. Listen a little if the person seems to know what they're talking about, but don't be discouraged. If you're trying to be expansive and they're telling you to be cautious, they're probably wrong and you're probably right. No one else says this, so I'm happy you emailed me - I'll say it. Fuck them. They're not bad people per se, but people do terrible things. I quit sugar or starting eating healthier and people want to drag you back down, "C'mon, have one slice of pizza... it's just a bite of cake... c'mon, you can have one drink..." - I still can't explain exactly why people do it, but I think it's to protect their own identity. As you become excellent, you show them what they could be, and it hurts them. Viscerally. So don't be too upset, your excellence hurts people to some extent. Expect constant discouragement from normal people. Eventually you'll build a social circle of high-achieving, ambitious, expansive, cool, worldly, giving, encouraging, awesome people, and then you'll be successful and normal people will envy and hate you, but you won't care because you'll have transcended it. So yeah, discouragement and warnings and crap? We all get it on the road to success. Don't take it too seriously. Don't hate people for doing it, but don't give in either.

*I strongly recommend tracking your time for a while, to see where it goes.

*Start filling up your dead time. Bring a book or audio with you when you're running errands, commuting, things like that. Life is precious, either explicitly relax, or do something valuable. Staring off into space slackjawed doesn't relax/recharge. So either take some breathes and really really relax in the dead time, or read, or listen to audio.

*Definitely start listening to audio if you don't yet. This is huge, you can pick up massive lessons in no addition time for it. Audiobooks, audio programs, podcasts. Your phone probably plays mp3s, if not, buy a phone that does or an iPod, buy a used one if you don't have much money. Used they're quite cheap. Listen while you walk, while you get groceries, while you wait in line, while you're commuting, things like that. That converts dead time into good time. I'd recommend Brian Tracy's "The Luck Factor" - probably my all-around favorite program for re-listening ability. Tony Robbins is good. There's some good podcasts out there - 37Signals has some good podcasts. I listen to lots of audiobooks too. This one is big, start listening to audio if you don't.

*Take a few deep breathes once per day. The cost of this is trivially easy, and the results are very large compared to the energy cost. You'll feel more alert, awake, stronger, and healthier.

I guess I could go on forever, but this email has already gotten quite long. Those are some general guidelines for what to do if you're not sure what you want yet. Start building skills, credentials, money, contacts. Study some history to see what's possible. Study rationality and learn how to think. Learn practical skills, like how to do arithmetic fast, type fast, get along with people, negotiate. Establish good habits.

These all prepare you to be really exceptional once you do have an excellent mission or goal at the end of the road. Once you find what you want to do, you'll be very happy you prepared.

Thanks for the email, this was great. I'll put my reply up on the blog, and ask if anyone else has any good comments or suggestions - we'll probably get another few good replies there, so look for that.

Thanks and best wishes,

Sebastian

Your additional suggestions in the comments, dear reader?