When Breast Cancer survivor, New York Times Best Selling author and columnist Regina Brett turned 45, she wrote a viral blog post with 45 life lessons she’s learned that she eventually updated with 5 more lessons when she turned 50.
Thanks to the resourceful but not the best fact-checking culture called social media, her 50 lessons have been reposted, reshared, repurposed and remixed.
These days, they are most commonly linked to 45 lessons from a 90 year old.
I found this post at Stumble Upon and extracted my fave 15 of these lessons to share here but when I took the five minutes to find the original author of the lessons, I quickly and easily learned that they were written by Brett, not a 90 year old woman.
And Brett looks nothing like the photo of fashion designer Iris Apfel that is often posted along with Brett’s tips!
I tell ya, it took minutes to track down the source. It helps that Brett updated her blog’s about page to clear up the mix up and explain her urban legend-hood. She is in Snopes.com and everything!
These days, I’ve discovered content I’ve written from years back in various places without attribution so I truly can appreciate the importance of giving credit where credit is due so please all check out Brett’s entire list on her website HERE!
And among them, here are my top 15 faves, many of which I try to practice daily and so they easily resonated with me:
1. Life isn’t fair, but it’s still good.
2. Don’t buy stuff you don’t need.
3. Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up the present.
4. Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
5. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.
6.Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.
7. Get rid of anything that isn’t useful. Clutter weighs you down in many ways.
8. It’s never too late to be happy. But it’s all up to you and no one else.
9. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don’t save it for a special occasion. Today is special.
10. Overprepare, then go with the flow.
11. Frame every so-called disaster with these words, ‘In five years, will this matter?’
12. Don’t audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.
13. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we’d
grab ours back.
14. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
15. Life isn’t tied with a bow, but it’s still a gift.
Good stuff! Thanks Regina Brett!
Jay Jay Ghatt is also editor at Techyaya.com, founder of the JayJayGhatt.com and JayJayGhatt.com where she teaches online creators how to navigate digital entrepreneurship and offers Do-It-For-You Blogging Service. She manages her lifestyle sites BellyitchBlog, Jenebaspeaks and JJBraids.com and is the founder of BlackWomenTech.com 200 Black Women in Tech On Twitter. Her biz podcast 10 Minute Podcast is available on iTunes and Player.fm. Follow her on Twitter at @Jenebaspeaks. Buy her templates over at her legal and business templates on Etsy shop!
