Advice Essay

Giving and receiving life advice is a topic that should be taken seriously due to the potential results it can yield. It’s actually almost natural. It’s instinct to give and seek advice from others. Many people have different priorities, which can lead to a need for an entirely different spectrum of advice. Sometimes giving advice can easily prevent a situation, or in extreme conditions, turn someone’s life around. It can be tremendously valuable because even if someone doesn’t accept your advice, it gives them ideas to contemplate in order to solve the problem. I would like to say that life is way too short to make the all of the mistakes ourselves. Might as well let somebody inform you of what didn’t work out for them. I’ll be mentioning life advice that personally has had an impact on the way I think and act. This advice touches up on the subjects of lying, future planning, and most important of all, personal life satisfaction. If it’s one thing that I learned while working at a restaurant over the past few years, it’s that a mistake is much easier to forgive than a lie. When I first heard this, I took a little time to stop and think. I told myself, in the future I can either tell the truth about my mistake, or I can take the risk and lie. I also thought that if I lied and got caught, I could face even more severe consequences. While one might be tempted to lie in a situation, he/she also needs to review what consequences can come along with the risk. For instance, when I was in the restaurant business, there was a complicated situation between a close co-worker of mine and our supervisor. This co-worker of mine worked the cash register at the café, and one night after closing, the register was short by fifty dollars. It turns out that he broke a customer’s one hundred dollar bill and accidently gave the customer too much cash back. Instead of accepting his mistake in fear of being fired, he lied about it and said someone else was working the register when the situation occurred. In order to see what really went down, my supervisor reviewed the security cameras and found out that my co-worker lied. He was fired on the spot for not telling the truth. In hindsight, my co-worker would have honestly been fine if he had admitted to his mistake. The moral of the story is that if you are caught up in a similar sticky situation, always tell the truth. It can’t hurt to admit your mistakes. Acknowledge your mistake and use it as a learning situation. If you learn from the mistake, chances are that it will never happen again. This piece of advice is ideal when it comes to the school and work environment. When I was still back in high school, my guidance counselor told me to plan my day the day before, and plan my week the week before. Prior to receiving this advice, I always held a lazy personality when it came to any type of future planning or organizational skills. I never thought about the next week, little less the next day. I never used a calendar. I never even kept a list of things to do. I took this advice to heart and tried my best to get as far ahead as I could in terms of future planning. At this point in high school, I knew I wanted to go to Virginia Tech. While everyone else was filling our regular applications to Virginia Tech, I was filling out my early decision application. I already began planning on what classes I was going to take if I got accepted. The feeling was great. Knowing that I was in full control of my life and that there was not much more that I could do at this point was a great sensation. As a reward for my prior planning, I was able to relax the second semester of senior year after being accepted while everyone else was panicking about deadlines and which college to pick. Now that I am a Junior in college, I have the Business Horizons career fair coming up next week. Because of this advice, I was able to prepare for it in advance. I expect great things to come of it. If anyone ever has a problem related to being lazy or not being able plan ahead, I would absolutely recommend this advice. I have even noticed that I have a more positive attitude in life as a result. This includes having more energy, having more time to do what I love, and having the satisfaction that everyone is behind you in the race of life. It has gotten me very far in life, and hasn’t let me down yet. The most essential piece of advice I would have to give is that if you are constantly comparing your life to the lives of others, you will never be happy. People need to stop doing things in life just because they simply think that they should because everyone else is doing it. Having kids, owning certain things, working a certain job, or even living somewhere just because everyone else is doing it is just wrong. It won’t make you happy. Do what you want and forget the rest. I would give this advice because I actually was caught up in what everyone was doing to the point that I was hanging out with people that I knew didn’t make me happy. I found my grades dropping, classes being skipped, and my parents were even questioning if I was happy or not. I decided to fix this during my sophomore year of college. I stopped hanging out with my old friends and joined a fraternity. It was easily the best choice that I’ve ever made. I met a great group of guys who have similar interests with me. I could definitely say I gained more out of it than I could ever put in. This piece of advice has undoubtedly been the best advice I have ever received. It buried my past and opened new doors that will hopefully lead to some great expectations. The advice that I have described has helped me overcome obstacles that I never thought I could have overcome by myself. I would give this advice to anyone in need without any hesitation. It’s important to listen to your peers when it comes to experiences that they have already experienced. That itself is the greatest advice of all time. Someday I hope I can get the chance to share these great pieces of advice with people who need it.