In the face of loss and misfortune, it’s easy to be jaded, to become cynical. In a word; don’t. Cynicism is the armor of the weak-hearted, too afraid to believe or stand or reach for anything. I hope you have the strength to hope, to dream, and to trust. Yes, your hopes won’t always come true, you will fall short of some goals, and people will abuse your trust. But, you might get to live your dreams. Some people you choose to trust will prove themselves worthy of that leap, and every now and then, you’ll get more than you ever hoped for. And on those days where life can’t get any better, when the sun shines warm on your face and you get to kiss your beautiful wife, drink a cold beer, and watch your son play in the sand, I hope you don’t feel the cynical jab of “I was right and they were wrong.” Instead, I want you to feel the pure unadulterated joy that those sanguine moments in life can bring.

I have two quotes about cynicism to share with you, and the first is from Norm Macdonald, who died this week at 61. He said, “At times, the joy that life attacks me with is unbearable and leads to gasping hysterical laughter. I find myself completely out of control and wonder how could life could surprise me again and again and again, so completely. How could a man be a cynic? It is a sin.”

If there’s one thing I know I’m qualified to give you advice about, it’s worry. I have anxiety and depression, and there were weeks and months where I was the Simone Biles of worry. The greatest. Except that I didn’t have the self-awareness to step back and take a break from it. I ended up almost drowning in self-doubt, not understanding my own mind, and finally, finally checking myself into a hospital because I was so lost. That led me to go back on medicine for the mental illness and to start regular therapy to get my head right. I still do both, and it’s put me in a much better, happier place. And I worry less.

I hope you never experience that depth of worry and anxiety. But even if you don’t have mental illness, worry can steal the joy from your days, the sleep from your nights, and the fun from all the things you love to do. How then, can you get out from under it? How can you not worry when there’s a never-ending list of things to worry about?

Revenge sounds sexy as hell. When I think about all the times I’ve been wronged, hurt, or cheated, my first instinct is to even the score. To the driver who cut me off, I want to accelerate into their bumper and push them off the road. To the boss who didn’t defend my work to a client, I want to let someone ruin their best idea. To the friends from college who waited until I fell asleep on their sofa and dangled their nuts by my sleeping face, I want to break into their house twenty years later and return the favor. And in each of these situations, my instinct is completely wrong. Every one of these are unhealthy sentiments, and I’m going to tell you why you should leave revenge to the movies.

Confucius said, “Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.” Good point, Confucius. But also, no shit Confucius was wise. Water is wet and the sky is blue. And while a man digging two graves before he embarks on a journey of revenge would be a great opening for a movie about a flawed character hell-bent on revenge, let’s not cast you in that role.

Everybody’s got problems. You, me, and everyone you know. Even mega-famous billionaire and rap mogul Jay-Z has 99. And I’m here to tell you to leave other people’s problems alone. As tempting as it is to swoop in and save someone you love from a situation you’re sure you have the solution to, don’t do it. Take it from a recovering “other people’s problem solver,” you, your friends, and everyone you know will be better off if you leave other people’s problems to the people whose problems they are.

How can I be so heartless? What if other people need your help? Up to a point, I’m not talking about these situations. If your buddy’s car breaks down and he asks you for a ride, by all means, help him out. If he chooses not to get his car fixed and expects you to drive him all over creation, I’d reconsider doing so. But generally, I’d say it’s okay to help people with their problems when they ask for your help.

The other people’s problems you should avoid fixing are the ones they didn’t ask for your help with.

You’re going to lose some, and you’re going to win some. You may feel like you it’s all your fault when you lose and you deserve all the glory when you win, but the whole truth is, that’s only half true. There’s usually plenty of blame and credit to go around in both scenarios. Learning that will make you a better sport, help you succeed more often, and help you deal with failure when it happens.

It’s easy to believe you fail or succeed on your own merits, all the time. In reality, the difference between the two might be something that has nothing to do with you and could be completely out of your control. No matter how hard you try, you’re going to lose when you deserve to win. Aaaaand you’ll sometimes win when you deserve to lose.

The late Skip Prosser once said, “Never delay gratitude.” Prosser was the Wake Forest men’s basketball coach who died in 2007 from a heart attack. He was 56. Prosser said a lot of quotable things, including (when speaking of 6’11” Kyle Visser’s difficulty finishing under the basket after a game,) “I’ve never been 6’11”, but if I was, I think I would dunk it.” And while his thoughts on gratitude aren’t the funniest or even quippiest thing he ever said, they’ve always stayed with me.

This is about friends. Making them, keeping them, and losing them. I’ve done all three, and so will you. But before you get too far down the river of life, I want to teach you how to hang onto the friends you should keep; it won’t happen on its own.

Somewhere in your twenties, you’ll have the most friends you’re ever going to have. Maybe just out of college and working a new job, or maybe your number of friends will peak in school, when you’re surrounded by people your age with tons of time to socialize. Either way, as you age, have kids, focus on your career, and life generally gets in the way of social activities, that number will drop. You might be sad about it; that’s okay, but there’s not much you can do to stop it…

Since I titled this project “Important shit I can’t teach my son yet,” it’s time we talked about shit. Not the smelly kind, but the word itself and all it’s 4-letter friends. While I’ve touched on this topic by virtue of a sprinkling of f-bombs, we haven’t explicitly discussed profanity. If you guessed I’m for it, you are correct. But as with most things, in fucking moderation.

When used correctly, profanity is the hot sauce on your barbecue, adding the zing to any sentence. Hell yeah, right? But just like hot sauce, too much overpowers everything else and makes your ass burn the next day. Fuck that. To help you figure out how much hot sauce you like on your English language, here’s how I think about profanity, when you should use it, and when you shouldn’t.

I hope you get the chance to be a father; I’m only three years in but so far, I’m for it. Two thumbs up, would recommend. That said, fatherhood is not for everybody. So, if you’re thinking about it someday and wondering if it’s for you, here’s what it’s like, based on my limited experience. My limited experience; I’m sure other Dads see it differently.

First, big duh, but fathering a baby is not the same as being a father. If it was, I wouldn’t qualify. See, we didn’t take the traditional road to starting a family because we couldn’t. We tried, but my testicles are like my earlobes, they don’t make sperm. So, we used IVF and a sperm donor. (None of this will be news to you, but you’re not the only one who reads these.) So for me, fatherhood is less about making babies and more about changing diapers.

Who cares what other people think?

All of us, pretty much. And when it comes to social norms and maintaining a civilized society, that’s mostly a good thing. When it comes to questions like, “should I put on pants today?” or “should I poop here?” I encourage you to definitely care what other people thing.

I also hope you learn when not to care about what people think…

I hope you learn to be kind and honest. Of all the qualities I want for you, those come first. After that, I hope more than anything else, you are persistent. More than intelligence, talent, or strength, I hope you learn the value of persistence, especially in the face of self-doubt, failure, and rejection. Why? Because not only does persistence matter more than talent (I’ll let Calvin Coolidge tell you why), you decide how persistent you are. More on that later, and here’s Calvin:

Inevitably, someone who created something you love will disappoint you. It might be an author who wrote your favorite book, but then publicly expresses cultural or political views that you find abhorrent. Maybe your favorite player on your favorite team will punch a stranger in a bar, or his girlfriend in the face. Maybe your favorite musician will allegedly imprison and have sex with several minors. Or maybe, your favorite celebrity will say something racist, or take their dick out, or be really shitty to a bunch of people. And suddenly, you might feel the need to re-evaluate your feelings about this person, your fandom, the thing they created, and its role in your life.

I’ve been in these spots before, and I’m going to work through what I’d tell you to do here.

But.

I don’t have easy answers for these scenarios. Wish I did, but definitely don’t…

You’re going to make lots of decisions in your life. Hard ones, easy ones, impossible ones, and ones that aren’t really decisions at all. Sometimes, you’ll make a good decision. Sometimes, you’ll make a bad decision. This entry is not about how to make better decisions or how to avoid bad decisions. No, this one’s about the importance of actually making decisions. Or, in the words of Yogi Berra, “When you get to a fork in the road, take it.”

I applied to three graduate film school programs while I was a senior in college and got into none of them. So, I got a job at Capital One in Richmond, VA, bought some khakis, and went to work. Hated it. Not for me. And after a year of working there, I re-applied to eight or nine schools and got into The University of Miami. Meanwhile, I fell in love. And suddenly, I didn’t want to leave Richmond. What did I do? I made a series of very bad decisions that culminated in one very good decision.

I’ve been to lots of weddings, and I was even in one with your Mom. Which means I’m qualified to give advice about weddings. At least, as qualified as I am to give advice about anything. So, I’m going to share some thoughts about why they matter, why you should go to other people’s weddings, and what to think about when you eventually have your own. Think of this as your guide for how to have fun at a wedding, how not to ruin someone else’s, and how to actually enjoy yours.

At my friend Dan’s wedding he told me, “there’s only two times in your life when everyone you love comes to see you, but you only get to enjoy one of them.” And that’s why it’s worth making the effort to go to weddings. Yes, they can be expensive to attend and are sometimes inconvenient. Still, it’s important to show up for the people you love. And usually, weddings are fun.

You can trust some people. Others, not so much. Unfortunately, the difference isn’t always obvious. It feels like it should be, but most people don’t hold their nose when they bullshit you and they certainly don’t put on halos when they tell the truth.

If that’s the case, how can you sniff out the bullshit? Well, if it seems to good to be true, it probably is. Start from there. But even with that start, you’ll need to be wary; there are plenty of people in the world who are happy to piss on your leg and tell you it’s raining; you need to learn the difference. For example, if your foot is warm, it’s probably not rain.

You should wait tables. Or maybe, tend bar. You could also work retail, fast food, or have any job where you deal with the general public. I say this not because I see a career for you in any of these jobs, but because I want you to have these experiences.

Why? Because I’ve waited tables, worked in fast food, in a gas station, in a movie theater, in a sandwich shop, and briefly tended bar. And in each of these jobs, I’ve marveled at just how terrible the average person acts towards the people working these jobs.

Every night before bed we ask you to help us put away your toys. Usually, you help while singing a song that goes “clean up, clean up, every day.” It’s definitely cuter than it is efficient; we could probably do it ourselves in half the time. But that’s not the point. The point is to make picking up your toys a habit. And my hope is that this habit leads to taking care of your toys and eventually taking care of all your stuff. Because whether it’s your favorite purple car, an actual purple car, or even your own health, like Ben Franklin said, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

Sometimes, people you care about are going to think and say things you really, really disagree with. Whether it’s your friends, me or your Mom, or other extended family members, as you form your own opinions, you’ll find other people have formed completely different opinions. For the sake of this one, we’re going to assume you don’t create an echo chamber of people who only agree with you and reinforce the things you already believe. Mostly because even in that scenario, you’ll still be related to someone who’s going to contradict that echo chamber. We’ve all got at least one relative who would disagree with gravity for the sake of spicing up Thanksgiving dinner.

It’s easy to be scared in a whitewater kayak. You’re sitting in your boat in a nice calm eddy above a drop full of turbulent water, rocks, and more than a dozen ways to hurt yourself or maybe, if things go really bad, even get yourself killed. Your friends are at the bottom, waiting for you to go, but you’re afraid. Your stomach is in a knot, your hands are shaking, your mouth is bone dry, and you can feel your butthole puckering up underneath you.

In this scenario, you can either paddle your boat a couple feet to the shore, get out, and carry your boat around the rapid, or peel out into the current and paddle downstream. My advice (both for myself, for anyone who asks for it, and for anyone reading this who didn’t ask for it) in these situations is simple: “embrace the pucker.”

I’m not sure I could teach you how to be popular, even if I wanted to. I never felt like I was when I was growing up, so it might be a bit like asking our dog Stella to teach you to drive a stick shift. Truthfully, I’d rather teach you how to make friends and be a good friend to others. I think that will serve you better.

Besides that, talking about popularity and social status gives me a case of imposter syndrome, as if all the people I consider friends are suddenly going to reveal they’ve been trolling me for years and actually think I’m a total tool.

So, I’d rather teach you the resilience and self-confidence you need to be less concerned about popularity and social status and more focused on finding connections that make you happy.