08-04-2025
Are You Stuck? Maybe You Need Advice From Your Younger Self
Close up view of wood core.
What advice would you give your younger self? The assumption underlying this question is that older = wiser. If our older selves could only have advised our youthful selves, just imagine what pain and heartache we might have been spared, what bad choices we could have avoided! 'I wish that I knew what I know now, when I was younger,' sings Ronnie Wood in the Faces song 'Ooh La La.' Oh, yeah.
Maybe you would counsel your younger self to study harder or to worry less about what other people think. If I had the chance, I might tell young Hanna not to quit piano lessons (you'll regret it later!) and I would definitely tell her to go to the Galapagos with her boyfriend (now husband ) instead of working. I'm still kicking myself about that one. Our older, wiser selves could also provide much-needed perspective in times of difficulty, reassuring us that we will get through the hard time and emerge stronger. (This is the premise of the 'it gets better' project aimed at LGBTQ kids.)
But what if the reverse is also true? What if our younger selves also have wisdom to offer us?
I got to thinking about this on a walk with a client who is a successful engineering leader in a tech company and has reached a plateau in his career. He's not driven to attain a higher title or salary, nor by prestige or power. I asked him to recall what motivated him when he was younger in his career. One motivation was proving himself, but that is no longer a driver for him. But his other source of youthful energy was building things. 'I haven't built anything in a while,' he said. So he plans to build something—get back to writing code—and see what sparks.
I wonder: what other drives, values, beliefs and assumptions have we left behind or forgotten that could help us live and work better now? What advice might your younger self give you? Here are some pearls of wisdom that might come from youth:
As these examples demonstrate, childhood's developmental milestones can remind adults of what life has to offer, even as we also navigate our own ongoing adult development. Jennifer Garvey Berger, author of 'Changing on the Job,' proposes that adult development is not about linear progression through stages where we leave it all behind, but instead an expansion of our ability to make sense of the world and relate to ourselves, with each progressive stage building like rings of a tree. Sometimes, perhaps, we need to be reminded of the wisdom of our earlier stages.
The beautiful and quirky coming-of-age movie from 2024, 'My Old Ass' explores the idea that Elliott, an 18-year-old girl could, by virtue of a mushroom trip, establish contact with her 39-year-old self. Her older self, played by the brilliant Aubrey Plaza, advises her to be nicer to her mother and spend more time with her brothers before going off to college—good advice that she follows. But she also warns young Elliott to stay away from a boy named Chad, hoping to save her(self) pain. [Spoiler Alert]
Wisdom can flow in both directions. So what about you? What earlier version of yourself do you need to hear from now?
