Life is about learning, it is essential in order to grow and change and prevent stagnation. Stagnation after all is smelly, and who wants to be smelly? So, at the end of another year with 2018 looming, I thought I would recap some of the gritty things I’ve learnt and re-learnt, as I don’t always get “it” the first time.

1. No comparisons – ever, there’s nobody just like you.
2. Break the rules – you cannot make a difference by simply being like everyone else.
3. Stop thinking and act – nothing changes if you don’t.
4. Take custody of your words – use them only for good, especially on Facebook.
5. Everyone remembers things differently – it’s the human condition to experience things differently than another.
6. Acknowledge others input – it’s a key human need to be acknowledged, even if you disagree.
7. Tell people you love them – half my immediate family have passed, it would be nice to have said it more often.
8. Work on your health – without it life sux.
9. Be vulnerable – let people in, it helps building real relationships.
10.  Ask for what you want – people are not mind readers, ask, they can only say no.
11.  Be ruthless with your standards – I don’t care what anyone else is doing or saying, you always have to answer to your standards, make them high.
12.  Surround yourself with people you aspire to
13.  Agree to disagree – no need to be a right fighter.
14.  People come first – that includes you.
15.  Celebrate your inner weirdo – eccentric is not a dirty word.
16.  The only person you can change is you.
17.  Laugh a lot including at yourself – takes the sting out of anything.
18.  Listen more than you talk – I’m still working on that one.

What’s on your list?

My new book The Albino Chameleon is coming out soon.

You can learn more and register your interest right here.

Til then.

Kirsty Ferguson

Founder, International Career Coach and Author

www.thealbinochameleon.com