I asked 2,800 people for the best life advice they’ve ever received. This is what they said. 

The wisdom of crowds is rarely wrong.

I posted a poll on Instagram asking people for the best piece of advice they’ve ever received. Below is a curated list of how hundreds of people responded. 

I combined the responses with answers from a second poll, which asked: What advice would you give the person you were one year ago?

Crowdsourcing life lessons led to an outpour of wisdom. Much of it is profound, some are cliché. All together, it’s an excellent pick-me-up and reassurance. 

Listed anonymously, I’ve divided the advice into three categories: Relationships, Timing and the Future, and Personal Growth

People of all ages from all walks of life hold wisdom. Too often, we forget to listen.

This list is our chance to change that.

Relationships

• Establish boundaries in relationships. Vocalize them and stick to them.

• You can lie down for people to walk on you, and they’ll still complain you’re not flat enough.

• Be compassionate to others if they say they are struggling. If they don’t say they are struggling, consider the trauma that they may not show on the surface, the trauma that they are trying to hide.

• Three things for better relationships: acceptance, appreciation, understanding. Master these and everything improves.

• Keep your friends close after you graduate college. It gets harder and harder to see people that you once saw on a daily basis. Roommates, classmates, people around campus — everyone’s removed from this context. Now, spending time with people takes intention and effort. It isn’t a passive occurrence anymore.

• Relationships are a choice. You have to wake up everyday and decide to care.

• Love can be amazingly simple and so outrageously complex all at once. If a person can just focus on the moment and do their best to be supportive, then love is simple. When we look for something or expect something for the future, love becomes complex.

• Be honest with the tough questions: Is this — are we — working? Do our visions of the future align? Ask honestly. Answer honestly. Then brace for impact.

• To expand the conversation of love beyond just romance, first understand the effort that loving someone takes. To broaden our conception of love, understand that it is no easy thing to undertake, and the effort is massive.

• There is nothing more you can offer anyone other than your very best. If you’re doing this, nothing more is required.

• If there’s a potential relationship to build, do it. Personal or professional. That potential doesn’t last forever. You can always repair a bad first-impression but you can never go back and recapture missed moments.

• Help the people you know to grow, and you’ll grow alongside them. 

• Nine out of ten times, it’s not about you — so don’t take it personally. 

• Just because no one’s at fault doesn’t mean it isn’t time to move on. Things happen. Take these things in stride and stay level-headed. As fast as things can collapse into oblivion, they can repair again too.

• Don’t let your insecurities and fears dictate the outcome of your relationships. What are you most nervous about? Don’t let that impact your decisions.

• Make your story bigger than just yourself. Find ways to contribute something positive to others as often as possible. Give and give and give. Aim for the greater good with the actions you take everyday.

• What you appreciate, appreciates. 

• Empathy isn’t just about placing yourself in someone else’s shoes. It’s about understanding and acknowledging the human experience of another, regardless of biases or value systems. Do this, but beware unbounded empathy can be hazardous.

• Good intentions matter, but your actions will define you. 

• Invest in those who invest in you. People who show up for you should be cherished.

• Don’t play games. Everyone thinks that building a relationship needs games or lines — scripts — but that isn’t true. Tell the truth even if it’s blunt. Even if it isn’t pretty. If your partner is as honest as you, there should be no uncertainties.

Timing and the future

• It’s far more important to figure out what you don’t like rather than what you do. 

• Have you ever heard the saying, “nobody looks back on their life and remembers the nights they had plenty of sleep?” I would tell myself that saying is complete bullshit. Everybody is with you at the party but nobody is with you for the hangover. Pick and choose how you invest your time, don’t just “spend” it.

• Invest early and often. 

• Face the music when it plays, not a moment before. Stressing about something before it happens, and when you’re in no position to act on that stress, just puts you through the event twice unnecessarily. Things happen — or don’t happen — right on time.

• When you graduate, all people talk about is getting a stable job and salary immediately. No one talks about the million other potential paths to take after graduating. Explore these fully, even though no one is talking about them.

• This too shall pass. 

• The more prepared I am, the luckier I get. 

• The biggest mistake you can make in life is thinking you have enough time. 

• Enjoy the little moments, as cliche as that sounds. Time really does fly. We look back one year ago and it feels like yesterday, but in reality so much has transpired. Grasp the small moments along the way and realize they won’t be there forever.

• Relax and see where life takes you. This doesn’t mean “be lazy.” This means you don’t have to know exactly where you’re going or how you’re getting there. It takes time to discover what you love and what you hate. Years, sometimes decades. Don’t expect to know all the answers in your 20s.

• Buckle up — life turns upside down often and unexpectedly. How can you prepare yourself for these moments? There is no one correct answer, but just by asking the question, you remind yourself that something is coming to try and knock you off course.

• Don’t worry about having everything figured out, because you never will. The best thing you can do is make progress, no matter how slow. Moving in the right direction is more important than arriving.

• The future is coming. No one doubts that. But don’t let it distract you from what’s right in front of you. The future will get here when it gets here.

• I wouldn’t have much advice to offer other than just show up. Showing up is a lot more than most people do.

• I wouldn’t tell myself anything. All the challenges and hardships have landed me exactly where I was going. No advice can save someone from facing the things that await them.

Personal growth

• Get really, really good at things other people won’t do or don’t want to do. 

• First, don’t sweat the small stuff. And second — it’s all small stuff. 

• Instead of worrying about your future, your career, and the fact that, for the first time ever, your life’s purpose isn’t school, focus instead on being present. Be present and realize that everything will work out.

• Don’t gamble.

• It is what it is, so control what you can control. 

• Take care of your mental health. Just because you don’t have a specific ailment doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take actions to optimize your mental health. Gratitude, mindfulness, meditation — these are a good start.

• Read every single day or else risk not growing as much as you could.

• Trust your own path without worrying what other people are doing. Comparing yourself, consciously or subconsciously, to the successes of others isn’t going to propel you forward.

• This is not a rehearsal.

• Give yourself permission to accept the help and resources available to you. 

• Always give yourself something you have to do. 

• Don’t forget what a blessing it is to simply be alive and healthy. 

• Start meditating. It can declutter your mind and relieve you of a lot of unnecessary stress.

• Listen to stand-up comedy when you’re getting ready in the morning. Starting the day off with laughter and smiles makes everyday just a little bit better.

• If it isn’t going to impact your life five years from now, reconsider if you should stress over it today. 

• You’ll stop caring what people think about you when you realize that they seldom do.

• Spend time doing the things you love. Don’t succumb to what other people or groups may deem enjoyable. Invest time in the passions and hobbies that you enjoy.

• Comparison is the thief of joy. 

• The most progress is made outside of your comfort zone, but you have to force yourself to get outside of it first. 

• Loving yourself is the greatest gift you can give yourself and should be the priority in your life. Self-love opens the door to finding happiness and meaning intrinsically, rather than seeking it in someone or something else.

• Do whatever it takes to not let your job interfere with your health. Prioritize your own well-being.

• Stay curious. 

• A loss is only a loss if you fail to learn from it. 

• There is never going to be enough time. This can’t be an excuse. Stop with this nonsense and just take action. If you really want to get up off your ass, why are you still sitting here reading this?

• Stop living for the approval of others. So many negative things will manifest themselves if you focus on this. You’ll never get their approval anyway, and you’ll make yourself miserable.

• Deploy patience more often. Good things happen, but they often take some time and momentum.

• Take bigger risks. When you’re young, when you’ve just graduated college, risk is much less “risky” than you think. Playing it too safe can make you miss certain opportunities.

• All those people living lives that you’re jealous of, they never got an invitation to do so. Most of them had average resources, wit, abilities etc. but they made different choices than you, worked harder, and were more disciplined. Take stock of what you have, and put in the work.

• It is better to be disliked for who you are rather than liked for a person you are not. 

• Don’t take your work home with you (if you can help it). If your work begins to negatively influence your emotions, something has to change.

• Everything feels the most intense when it happens for the first time. But that doesn’t mean that, after the first time, the task gets easier. You have to trust yourself that you’ll be stronger and braver the next time around.

• Don’t focus so much on how people perceive and act towards you. These things impact your behavior, though they shouldn’t. Focus on what you can do and are doing for yourself.

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I used these ideas to write a bestselling book in a year while working full-time as a journalist. Learn more on Amazon.

Note: Portions of this list was curated from a previous crowdsourced story I wrote on The Post-Grad Survival Guide. 

Photos by Tara Winstead, Nappy, Juan Pablo Serrano Arenas, and Caleb Oquendo on Pexels.com on Pexels.com