If you could meet yourself for one week in the past what would you tell yourself?

I’d tell myself to not start smoking, but I prolly wouldn’t listen to me.

The most important thing I’d say is to be true to yourself.

I’d go back to my late teens and tell myself to swim parallel to the to the beach, don’t struggle so hard against the riptides of other peoples bull poop. Relax and go with the flow until you can safely get out of their soul sucking rip tides.

“These are the winning lottery numbers. Bet on all of these teams. Buy these stocks.”

I like @Symbeline s answer. Taking up smoking at 15 was a pretty dumb move, but at that age I wasn’t into listening to other peoples opinions. The trip back would likely be a waste. Now if I could bring some stock market data or lottery numbers back…

I would get beaten up by myself for my lunch money

I would go back to me at 18 and I would tell myself not to go out on that date that ended up haunting me for 15 years.

I would teach Lawrence not to marry any women who are in need of rescue, who choose to act helpless, or whose goal is to remake me to suit their needs no matter how it undermines my needs and plans.

I would instead teach me to insist on a woman of integrity with a sense of humour who consistently loves and respects me and who has goals and values of her own which mesh well with my own.

I would teach me to avoid procrastinating and to overcome the fears of failure and /or success that held me back for several years.

Of course I would advise me to avoid the situation in which I became disabled.

I would have told myself not to marry that stupid ‘beeyotch’.

I would insist I enter therapy immediately instead of waiting for 40 years.

Oh. Hm. The week before I began high school. I’d tell myself to be less shy and be more confident. Maybe also remind myself how to spell ‘definitely’. That one took me ages.

@kyanblue The easy way to remember is ‘definite’ with ‘ly’ at the end.

@Blackberry @kyanblue: Even easier (although you’d never know it from the extraordinary misspellings on fluther) is to start with finite. Then add both the suffix de and the prefix ly.

This works for infinitely also.

Or use a synonym, which would be patently simpler and clearly less prone to error.

@gailcalled Yeah. I use my own way, I was just suggesting something that may be easier for him/her.

@Silhouette Hopefully it was not because you nearly was sucked out to sea

@bob_ @stranger_in_a_strange_land If you avidly followed the lotto and or the stock market you would not now what numbers won and when and if you had not the lead time to research that before you went back what would you do? Try to tell yourself to invent the Sham Wow before the person who actually invented it? Of course there would be some sporting events and stocks you remember with out cheat sheets so I guess you could still make a boat load if you listened and believed yourself.

@tranquilsea Sure hope you did not get roofied.

I would go back to October 2007 and tell myself not to go through with getting the tubal ligation. It would have made my life a lot easier right now if I didn’t have that stupid surgery done.

@Hypocrisy_Central Good point.

@Dr_Lawrence I’d pat myself on the back for “rescuing” Meg, but tell myself to keep her from going out last November 6th.

I’d tell myself not to marry my first wife. And I would remind myself to eat healthy so I wouldn’t contract diabetes like I did in 2006.

@Hypocrisy_Central I was nearly drownded (heheh) in other peoples drama before I learned to swim away from those riptides.

@Bluefreedom Ouch! But could you really have given up fudge brownies? I don’t think I could or Chewy Chips Ahoys.

Dont wear Orange on your first day of high school. They called me pumpkin all the guys and i got half their numbers by the winter formal.

@Hypocrisy_Central. It would have been incredibly hard, I admit. I had a serious sweet tooth and I used to love junk food. Man, I miss it so….........

Stop worrying so much about your weight.
Stay away from CB. Seriously. No, really.
Have confidence; you have a lot to contribute to the world.
Just tell your mother to shut up when she starts with her crap.

I have no regrets, so I wouldn’t change anything for fear it would change who I am now.

I would say….“look up!!” ;)

I would say… “you should try snowboarding and bmx and longboarding and all this other cool stuff. GO FOR IT!!”

Our Mom is right – in 100 years no one will even know we existed – meaning today’s pain will pass, just like the joys of tomorrow.

I’d tell myself not to quit my job and to instead go and thank the boss who gave me the opportunity.

@YarnLady

Yep, we all need to remember everything is impermanent by nature, hold on loosely, and this too shall pass.

As soon as the third one pops out, get the hell out of there! Don’t wait any longer, just go!

@YARNLADY, your answer struck me as depressing. I am pretty confident that in 100 years I will have some great-great grandchildren who know I existed.

Stay away from bingo next week. this last week has been lousy with luck.

I would tell myself to work on my marriage harder for the kids’ sake.

@SuperMouse Think back – all you know about your great-great grandparents is their names, and the fact that they had children, if even that

Just do it already.

Don’t go on a blind date with him.

@YARNLADY Even just knowing their names is knowing they exist. I know much more than that about one of my great-grandfathers. The second quip doesn’t make me feel less depressed about the concept. lol4rl!

@YARNLADY I know what my great great grandfather did for a living, where he was born, and a few amusing anecdotes from his lengthy and successful career. I know absolutely nothing about 13 of the other 15 of my great great grandparents though, not even their names.

@SuperMouse

I don’t find that concept depressing. It is just the nature of things.

Actually instead of seeing it as depressing, I see it as a great mantra for not taking anything in life too seriously.

If being revered forever is a goal I guess notoriety would be the way to go.

Forget being the president, a great author or a saint…if you really want to be remembered do a Jack the Ripper or Adolf Hitler stint.

Only the good die young and only the bad are canonized for eternity!

Being the oldest in the sandwich generation, I alone can pass on real information about my four grandparents to my nieces and nephews and, I hope, the greats.

I was the only one who spent lots of time with all four of my grandparents. I do know alot about their parents from anecdote and my grandfathers’ autobiographies. Happily they wrote them in English and not in Lithuanian, Polish or Yiddish. And they waited until they were in their eighties.

The info from earlier generations is sparse and found at the Jewish geneology and ancestor.com sites. There are also photocopies available of the US census from the beginning, but they are very hard to read.

@Coloma I mentioned nothing about wanting to be revered. However, I don’t think it is narcissistic to be depressed by the idea that my great-great grandchildren won’t even know I existed.

I know that my great-great grandfather was married to two different women on two different sides of town. I know that he had two complete families that he kept totally separate. I know he raised my grandfather after my grandfather’s father, who was a pharmacist, died in the flu epidemic of 1908. I also know my grandfather was named after him and how much my grandfather loved him.

@SuperMouse Wow – I’m impressed by the amount of knowledge there.

@SuperMouse

I didn’t say you wanted to be revered, just sharing my thoughts on that concept, being depressed because a future generation won’t know much, if anything about you..

I dunno…different strokes for different folks, my ego has no thoughts of who will or won’t remember me, much after the immediate ones that are left to do whatever amount of remembering that might or might not occur.

I’ll be dead, whether or not someone shares a fond memory about me won’t have much impact. hahaha