Advice to a 21 year old

This is great for those just starting out in life.

Excerpts from advice given by Cary Tennis:




You've been through a lot. Progress may feel slow. So how do you cope? You cope by sticking to a long-term plan. It takes time. It takes a lot of time. I don't know why we can't magically transform ourselves into happy, functioning people. It seems like they promise that in TV and movies and books but in real life it takes time.

But it happens. We find ways to sustain ourselves as we proceed. We have big goals and small goals. Our small goal is to get through the day. Some days we just concentrate on that. But as we're getting through the day, we're also trying to apply what we know, avoiding thoughts and behaviors that we know for sure will send us into a tailspin, and looking, where we can, for uplifting and helpful images that will sustain us.



You are building a life. Each piece of your life that works for you is crucial. Pay attention to the parts of your life that are working for you, and build on them.



Building a life is like putting a puzzle together. Each piece that fits adds to the sense of a whole picture. It might seem that you don't have anything close to a picture yet. That's OK. Visualize the puzzle of the life you want. There is indeed an outline to it. There may be only one or two pieces in it right now. But you have some pretty great pieces.
There is the high-intelligence piece. There is your verbal facility piece, your ability to write persuasively and with force. There is the kindness piece, your dedication not to harm others as you have been harmed, which is a wonderful piece.
And there is the piece that is your home. Look for a place of safety there.

Make some tea and sit and look out the window. Find moments of peace and hang on to them. Build on the good things and expand them outward so that they begin to take over and engulf the other things. This is how you heal. It's like watching a wound heal. You see how the good tissue comes in and slowly takes over. While a wound is healing you protect it. So that's what you do in your life. You are wounded in certain areas, so you protect those areas while they heal.

Choose one friend to talk to. Choose carefully. You are wounded in social areas, so you protect those places while they heal.
Because progress can be slow, in order to keep going you need some believable hypothesis that says this is going to get better. And you need some regular, pragmatic proof of that. In addiction recovery, we use the experiences of those around us as evidence of what may happen in our own lives if we do what they are doing.
 
It takes time. But it works.




You concentrate on the basics and you live one day at a time. You get up. You eat, you take a walk, you make it to your appointment.



That's how we do it. One day at a time. And why do we bother? Because we know that with a little bit of work, life can be pretty good. We also know there's no time to waste. You're 21. Pay attention. Stick around for the miracle.