What I wish I knew as a Teenager

What's up you guys? It's Graham here. So, all right, here we go. This topic has been requested a lot lately. So when you ask, you shall receive. Here's exactly what I wish I knew as a teenager. From all my videos, I really feel like this one is especially important to watch. I spent a lot of time reflecting on this and thinking this one through because if I'm gonna make a video on this, I may as well make it as impactful and actually useful as possible. None of the crap like, "Hey, well, I wish I bought Bitcoin in 2009," and, "I wish I knew the winning lottery numbers for the Mega Millions jackpot in 2007." I mean, yeah, that would be pretty cool. I wish I could do that, but you know, realistically, I just want this video to be helpful. You may as well learn from my mistakes; you could avoid them. As long as you come out ahead from this, then all of my mistakes have become worthwhile.

So without dragging out this intro into something unnecessarily long, let's just get right into it. And in no particular order, by the way, because all mistakes are created equal. The first thing I wish I knew as a teenager was knowing when to ask for help. If I'm any indication of what most people might be thinking, then I have a feeling this one is incredibly common for most people. No joke, when I was younger, I was either too embarrassed or too stubborn to ask anyone for help ever. If there was something I didn't know, I would resort to doing anything else first besides asking someone for help, even if that meant wasting hours of my time trying to figure something out. I would rather do that than just ask somebody.

It really wasn't until much later that I realized that asking for help is really no big deal, and most people are more than happy to pitch in if you just ask. I remember when I first started working as a real estate agent, I had no idea how to draft up an email to follow up with a client from an open house. I was too embarrassed to ask, and I didn't want to inconvenience anybody and like bother them by asking such a basic question. So obviously, instead, I just spent like over an hour drafting up a few sentences in an email, coming back to it, then redrafting it again, and then deleting it, and then doing it again, having no idea if what I was doing was right or if it even mattered. But as soon as I gave up and finally asked someone for help, my question was answered in a matter of seconds. It was a really great learning experience.

It showed me that asking for help is no big deal, and nothing bad ever happens. In fact, I think learning to ask for help is just an insanely beneficial skill to have. Plus, I just think it helps you become more assertive when you know how to effectively get things done and ask people for assistance when needed. I'm sure you guys all know the saying, "The squeaky wheel gets the grease," and this could not be more true in this situation. The person who gets the help is the one who just asks for it. So don't ever be afraid to go and ask for assistance if you ever get stuck on something.

Now, don't ever expect someone to do all the work for you, but at the right pivotal moments, asking for help can be insanely beneficial. Second, it's really important that you realize just how insignificant everything is. I nearly guarantee that anything that's bothering you right now is not going to matter a year from now. This one took me a very, very, very long time to internalize, but once I did, it changed my outlook on everything. Everything from going through breakups, thinking my life was ruined, missing opportunities, losing out on clients, losing out on commissions, losing money, getting screwed over — whatever you can think of, it's happened to me.

In the moment, I've always thought to myself, "Oh, my life is ruined! This is it! The worst thing ever! I'm done!" Plus, I'm just naturally the type of person to overthink everything. If there's some minuscule situation out there, I will replay the scenarios in my head over and over and over again until it eventually becomes like World War 3, where I imagine the worst-case scenario happening in every possible situation. Then I prepare myself mentally to handle the worst-case scenario that might eventually possibly one day, someday could possibly happen. But guess what? The point being none of it actually mattered, and the worst-case scenario never once ever actually happened. Usually, when I just overthink things and stress myself out unnecessarily, it turns out to never matter in just a few days. Never once did my imaginary situations in my head ever come to fruition, and that's the truth for pretty much everything.

No matter what's bothering you right now, chances are in a few years, you'll move on. You'll forget about it, and it's not going to matter. Knowing that makes actually going through those situations that much easier, especially when it happens to you a few times, and each and every time you've later realized, "Wait a second, that was no big deal." After that, it was all for nothing. I stressed myself out for no reason whatsoever, and everything is okay. Especially when you take a step back and really think about it, just how insignificant everything is in the entire scope of the universe. Our entire existence here on the planet is like a fraction of the blink of an eye, and we are so small when compared to the entire galaxy.

I don't say this to make you feel worthless or anything like that, but I just say this to put it in perspective. Chances are, whatever you're going through right now is not as big of a deal as you think it will be, and you will be okay in the long run. Basically, just don't let anything bother you. Don't waste your time on things that don't matter and just end up holding you back.

Now third, with that one, it's really important to understand which battles to pick and which ones to let go. Trust me, I want to say this one: not everything is worth fighting for, and it's so important to pick and choose your battles. I gotta say, probably most of them are not worth it and accomplished absolutely nothing. For example, is there something that happens by mistake and the other person is apologetic? If that's the case, don't sweat it! Mistakes happen, we're all human. Move on!

I make mistakes all the time, and I'm really just doing the best that I can with the information I have available to me at the time. I have good intentions, but hey, you know what? I still screw up from time to time, and that's life. For most situations like that, it's not worth fighting over. It doesn't really accomplish anything. The person knows they messed up and will improve next time. On the other hand, if there is something that's worth fighting for that will actually have a positive impact, then go ahead and fight for it, but it better be important. Understanding the differences between the two is absolutely vital.

Don't ever go after the stuff that isn't going to matter in the long run. This is why you'll never see me burning any bridges. Most of the time, if I don't have something good to say, I'd rather just not say anything at all and instead just smile. It's almost always just a smarter choice to let it go and just continue moving forward. Plus, it's just so much more beneficial to yourself to be focused on you rather than what other people are doing. It doesn't matter who's right or wrong; it just matters that you stick on your own path and you do you.

The next thing I wish I knew was how to smash the like button. Every minute a YouTuber goes without the like button being smashed, they suffer all alone with less than a 10 percent view to like ratio, just waiting for somebody to help. Hi, my name is Graham Stefan. Please say that you'll be the answer to an innocent YouTuber who needs your help to get the like button smashed. Please hit the like button on your screen or join the notification squad by ringing the little bell button. For the low cost of just one like button a day, you can help support a YouTuber in need of YouTube's algorithm's blessing. You'll help a YouTuber with the algorithm; you'll help provide them with more views and more money and more engagement.

This is a very special limited-time offer. If you smash the like button within the next 10 seconds, I'll finally stop asking for it. You'll also receive this beautiful screenshot of the like button being smashed, absolutely free. This is your chance to say, "I did my part to help the YouTube algorithm!" Anyway, no, being serious here, I have fun making this a little funny, and it keeps things exciting for me. Otherwise, I would just get bored.

So anyway, for real though, number four is that I wish I knew it's okay to fail, and it's perfectly fine to be wrong. That's life! At the end of the day, everyone is just winging it and doing the best that they can. Like half the time for me, I have no idea what I'm doing, and I'm just trying to figure it out as I go along. There's been so many times where I've made the wrong choice, I made mistakes, I failed at something, and that's perfectly fine because no one expects you to be perfect anyway. In fact, it would actually be weird if everything you did was perfect. If someone ever claims that, the first thing I'm thinking is that that person is a liar.

The way I see it, every failure happens for a reason, and I just believe that life is supposed to present certain situations to you so that you can learn from them, make mistakes, and grow, and then become a better person in the long run. If something ever happens to me, I always just think to myself, "This is really just a blessing in disguise. This was supposed to happen so that I can learn from it and become a stronger person in the future." I guarantee if you screw up big time, you are not going to make the same mistake again. You will avoid it, and you will become a better person because of it.

Even if you make a bad investment and lose everything, well guess what? You've got the best investing lesson that anyone could have ever gotten. If you fail at a business, now you know exactly what not to do, so you could avoid it the second time around. I think failure is really just necessary for success. In fact, I think it's mandatory that if you ever really get good at something, you have to expect to fail. That way, you don't just rely on blind luck to get you somewhere; instead, you rely on your wisdom and experience, and that will take you anywhere. So, just embrace failing, embrace being wrong, and expect it to happen so you can get it out of the way and then you can move on from there.

Now, the fifth one is just something I really want to emphasize to everyone watching because it's so important, and it's just this: just show up on time. Don't be late! Don't be flaky! Don't cancel last minute! Just make commitments and then stick with them. Half the battle is literally just showing up on time. It isn't always the most talented or the smartest person that gets all the opportunities. Sometimes, it's just the person that shows up in the first place at the right place at the right time who gets ahead.

So always make sure if you make a commitment and you say you're gonna be at a certain place at a certain time, that all you need to do is be there like you said you will. This is one of those things that I learned very early on from my mom. No matter how far in advance she would make plans, she would always show up on time without confirming anything, and she would always be 10 minutes early. I definitely take after her when it comes to doing this. With a few very rare exceptions, if I make plans, I will always be there exactly when I need to be there, 10 minutes early, without needing to reconfirm.

This very small detail makes a huge difference. You want to know why? It's because so few people actually ever do this. So when you are the type of person who shows up early to anything without needing to reconfirm, people treat it like you have superpowers or something. People almost act surprised that you show up early because that's not normal, and most people don't do that. So if you want to stand out, that's all you have to do. The more times you show up on time or early, the more chances you get at getting some sort of opportunity from that.

So anyway, those are the five things I really wanted to emphasize for anyone watching, and that way you could at least internalize these things and apply them to your own life as you see fit. Because, like I said, if you don't do this, then it's like I've made all of these mistakes for nothing, and you don't want that. Even though the video is really aimed towards teenagers, it really will apply to anyone at any age. Again, if you can have just some sort of positive impact, then it's all worth it, and I am happy.

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