For those 30+: What would you do differently?

Smiling Buddha

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You will view your thirties [EDIT: Should read twenties, but still works] differently in two, three, four years time than you do now.

Much differently when you are well into your next decade of life.

And you will also have the benefit of seeing other people go through their twenties and bare witness to where they wind up further down the road.

At present, you and I have lived enough of our twenties to know what being in ones twenties is like, but we don't have the perspective that comes from living a few years post-30.

You know what I mean.
 
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Silent Alarm

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This stands out like a dog's balls from the rest of your post. Do you really think that? Having nice clothes is for boring old ****s.
Is it though? I think clothes are the ultimate form of art... art is about instilling emotion, and nothing else elongates or inspires a meaningful feeling as much as a nice or bad pair of clothes. It's important and I don't care what anyone says. Whatever makes you feel good is profound.

This thread is mostly redundant anyway. We're all arrogant in our 20s. We heed the advice of hedonism we already live. We won't invest for us people more lively and less money-based, and that's through who we are... a bunch of people telling us to means nothing
 
May 5, 2006
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You will view your thirties differently in two, three, four years time than you do now.

Much differently when you are well into your next decade of life.

And you will also have the benefit of seeing other people go through their twenties and bare witness to where they wind up further down the road.

At present, you and I have lived enough of our twenties to know what being in ones twenties is like, but we don't have the perspective that comes from living a few years post-30.

You know what I mean.

Yeah, I think I'm picking up what you're putting down.

I don't have a perspective on my 30s. I can't, I'm yet to experience them. I've got a rough idea of what might happen, but 5 years from now I could be a goat farmer in Nepal - so who knows.

Your perspective on lots of things changes as you get older. I hope Silent Alarm goes back and reads his posts as a 25 year old. He'll cringe.
 

JD11

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Is it though? I think clothes are the ultimate form of art... art is about instilling emotion, and nothing else elongates or inspires a meaningful feeling as much as a nice or bad pair of clothes. It's important and I don't care what anyone says. Whatever makes you feel good is profound.

This thread is mostly redundant anyway. We're all arrogant in our 20s. We heed the advice of hedonism we already live. We won't invest for us people more lively and less money-based, and that's through who we are... a bunch of people telling us to means nothing
You need a hobby or something. Get out of your head.
 

kanye_best

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Is it though? I think clothes are the ultimate form of art... art is about instilling emotion, and nothing else elongates or inspires a meaningful feeling as much as a nice or bad pair of clothes. It's important and I don't care what anyone says. Whatever makes you feel good is profound.

This thread is mostly redundant anyway. We're all arrogant in our 20s. We heed the advice of hedonism we already live. We won't invest for us people more lively and less money-based, and that's through who we are... a bunch of people telling us to means nothing

i think your posts probably sound better in your head than they do out on the internet
 
Now that I am a month into my 30th year I can divulge my advice (which you can take or ignore as you please)

- Stay in shape, I don't mean you have to be super fit to do marathons or ironman triathlons or even necessarily join a gym (although they are a decent source of like minded people of the opposite gender). But if you try to get a decent job looking like a fatso then if it comes between you and the skinny bloke of similar age employers tend to pick against you.

- Cherish any time with your grandparents and great grandparents. I feel lucky to have seen both of my great grandmothers a matter of months before death, it gave a little brightness in their life and at least you don't feel as guilty about spending not enough time around them when they pass on.

- It's OK to look for cheap presents for Christmas and birthdays for siblings.

- Whilst money isn't everything, always have something substantial banked in case of major emergencies. That way you have some 'insurance' if you want to be a thrill seeker through travel or related activities.

- Always have something to look forward to and plan for in the future. If there's something planned to look forward to then at least you can stay motivated to reach that day or event.
 
May 5, 2006
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Seriously...would have loved to invested into property. Anyone who knows Balmain in Sydney, prices are ridiculous.

I think this is applicable to anyone given a long enough period of time.

I would have liked to buy my house before say 2004 or 2005 for example but I just wasn't old enough. I don't lament not 'getting on the property ladder' as a 20 year old uni student any more than I do not doing the same when I was in primary school - wasn't an option.
 

4evablues

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I think this is applicable to anyone given a long enough period of time.

I would have liked to buy my house before say 2004 or 2005 for example but I just wasn't old enough. I don't lament not 'getting on the property ladder' as a 20 year old uni student any more than I do not doing the same when I was in primary school - wasn't an option.

Sad thing I was old enough and had the opportunity to but decided to see and travel the world.
 

Smiling Buddha

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You regret traveling and wish you had bought a house instead?

Would you care to elaborate? Your age, where you traveled to, how old you were when you began to regret the decision, why you regret it now etc.

Is it simply a matter of wishing you had more money?
 
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I don't have a passport, but I've seen a fair bit of Australia; its cities, its highways, its large regional centres, the back of Bum* and beyond.
So I guess the regrets that I have at not (yet) having travelled overseas is off-set by having seen a lot of own country.
 
May 5, 2006
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Sad thing I was old enough and had the opportunity to but decided to see and travel the world.

Part of me sees this, part of me doesn't.

If not for travelling I would probably have a mortgage that is maybe $30k less than it is. No way in hell I regret that, no way in hell I would change that, but my time in the real estate market (first looking and poiking around home opens to making offers to being a mortgage slave etc.) has been 2007-2014 and there are places available today for comparable prices to what they were in 2007 so it's not like I would've been set up for life buying earlier.

If I was 5 years older and decided to travel in say 2005 then buy in 2007 I'd be miffed that I was paying off $100k+ more than I could've been. Everyone's different.
 

DirtySanchezWCE

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I'll make this a quick one, but i wouldn't have taken out a mortgage at 23, and instead gone overseas a lot more, a lot earlier.
Harder later to make up for lost time.
 

little graham

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If you're not preoccupied with image and possessions, filling your gut full of poison from fast food outlets or factory farmed food, back your instinct.

Find a girl, settle down,or if you both wanna run amok, run amok, look after each others back.

Find the people important to you and look after them.They're not necessarily family.

Be kind, be polite, be appreciative.

Read books
 
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Now that I am a month into my 30th year I can divulge my advice (which you can take or ignore as you please)

Are you a month into your 31st year? Or are you pre-empting this thread by 11 months!?


As someone only 4 months into their 31st lap of the sun, I have the tiniest bit of authority to post in this thread....

Things that I did which I would recommend:

Work a couple of years before starting Uni - You're 18, why would you want to potentially waste 3 or 4 years on a degree that you end up hating?
Take as long as possible before taking on any kind of major responsibility at your place of employment

Things that I didn't do which I would recommend:

Travel both around this country and overseas a couple of times before starting Uni / settling down to your 'real job/career' - Unfortunately I've only left the country once back in 09, and it was only 12 months ago that I travelled through the red centre for the first time (hitch hiked from Darwin to Alice Springs and then walked the Larapinta trail - Should have done it 5 years earlier -


Things that others have recommended that I concur with:


Stay in shape - I was always fairly lucky and had a good metabolism. In fact at high school and early 20s it worked 'too well' as I was desperately skinny and underweight. I was over 6 foot and barely 75 kgs. While I've never been a gym junky, I've always been semi-active - Trained martial arts and indoor soccer for quite a few years back in Adelaide, played pub footy for 5 seasons now and pretty much ride my bicycle around everywhere in Melbourne. However, because I was always skinny regardless of what I ate, I tended to eat crap.

However, I am now over 30, and in the past two years the bad eating, beer (especially beer) and non-diligent exercise has caught up with me to the point I have a 'gut' for the first time in my life. It's very confronting. I'm about 95 kgs, which would be ok if it was muscle as I'm 195cms but it's not all muscle.

Just got my tax return last week and I think I might purchase a gym membership with it (which would be a first...)
 
I wish I became proficient in a musical instrument.

Played guitar in school but only learned the basic chords. I was ever very good at it anyway. The left hand never knew what the right hand was doing.

Drums. Would love to be able to play the drums. If I hear a song I love, I am the best air drummer in the universe. Have got my technique down pat. Single stroke sevens, triple stroke rolls, paradiddle diddles. You name it, I can do it. Sit me in front of a real kit, one stick will fly across the room while the other one will manage to find its way up my nostril.
 
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