‘What’s a lesson you learned the hard way you wish someone had warned you about earlier?’ – 21 people who fiddled around and found out

Life lessons can be hard in a variety of ways, and those of us who made a lot of mistakes before we wised up often wish someone else had given us a heads up. But would we have listened? Probably not.

They’ve been chatting about this on the AskReddit page after Big_Acanthaceae_1384 asked this:

What’s a life lesson you learned the hard way that you wish someone had warned you about earlier?

And lots of people chipped in with the ways they’d been educated through bitter experience, like these…

1.

‘Your body isn’t invincible, and the way you treat it in your 20s (and even 30s) catches up brutally in your 40s+ often faster than you expect.’
–DiamondCalvesFan

2.

‘Thinking everyone hates you with no real reason WILL make everyone start to dislike you.’
–ASAMF0X

3.

‘People don’t change because you love them harder, they change because they choose to.’
–FirelineJake

4.

‘You don’t discover yourself. You create yourself. And to do that effectively, it requires dedicated work every single day.’
–Apocalypse_Wow

5.

‘How important financial literacy is. You need to understand APR, interest and that making minimum payments is not helpful in the long run.’
–northernguy7540

6.

‘Wanting everyone to like you isn’t worth it.’
–ruejay7

7.

‘Pop culture romanticises the ‘spark’. Good relationship are built on mutual respect and shared values. Not to say you can’t have it, but give the spark a chance to grow and don’t start swiping away after the first date because you didn’t like the way they folded their napkin.’
–Late-Paper-33

8.

‘The hardest lesson I’ve ever learned is that no one is coming to save you. We spend so much of our lives waiting waiting for the right person to choose us, waiting for someone to notice our pain, or waiting for a miracle to change everything. But the truth is, everyone is busy fighting their own silent battles. ​

It’s a lonely realisation, but also a liberating one. You eventually learn that your happiness, your healing, and your future are 100% your own responsibility. You can’t wait for an apology to move on, and you can’t wait for the world to validate you before you start loving yourself. In the end, you are the only person who will be there from the beginning to the very end. Be the person you’ve been waiting for.’
–The_Power_of_SL

9.

‘Instagram is not reality.’
–Grouchy-Dealer-342

10.

‘That pushing yourself past your limits doesn’t make you strong, it just teaches your body and brain to break quietly. And that most people aren’t judging you nearly as much as you’re judging yourself.’
–TJfreshman20

11.

‘Not everyone is telling the truth.’
–Grouchy-Dealer-342