Dear Derek

Some thoughts and insights from your 30-years-older self.

Enjoy what you doing when you doing it.  It does not get any better in hindsight.  You do not have to justify who are.

Expectations are really bad for you.  Trying to live up to what you think are other people's expectations is even worse; especially as every one is different!

You can and will change.  That is the basis for life.  There is no fixed "you forever" - just a series of "yous" that are each different in some way.

Love God. He does not have expectations and He loves you in ways that will take a long time to understand.  He cares much much more about who are than what you do.  Talk to Him first.

Love the person you are with.  You cannot guarantee their love in return (and sometimes that will hurt - a lot) but you will be true to yourself and your feelings.

Be honest. Even more - be honest and open (with love) in your relationships.  This is hard; especially when you have messed up.

Communication in a relationship is just about the hardest thing there is.  It will get better if you listen first, try and understand, and then communicate that understanding back (with as little judgement and assumptions as possible).  Always bear in mind that others are far more fragile than they appear; you cannot avoid hurting them and you cannot "fix" them afterwards; but you can listen and work on changing.

Its easy to spend money but hard to save it.  But saving it will have such huge benefits in your future that you must just do it.  Be accountable to someone about your finances.

Things will go wrong from time-to-time.  That is just "the way it is".  The real issue is not that they went wrong but how you dealt with them.

And remember - you're OK!

Derek

PS Post inspired by http://www.dearme.org/excerpt/ (and links to it...)