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What’s the Most Valuable Lesson You’ve Ever Learned?

What’s the Most Valuable Lesson You’ve Ever Learned?

on Mar 23rd 2012 with 76 comments

The Manual is a book for web designers, published in three editions annually. No, not an eBook, there’s no Kindle edition and you can’t read it on your iPad – it’s a printed, tangible book which you can put on an actual shelf. Interested in winning a year’s subscription? Read on to find out how..

Packed with stories and thoughts from our industry’s super stars, The Manual offers a very personal look at events and issues which shape the world of design and development. It makes for very compelling reading actually; each of the six contributors puts forward an article followed by a personal lesson.

The lessons can be enjoyed by everyone, as they’re not specifically design-related, and if you’re a nostalgic type you’ll find them particularly appealing. For example, I love Frank Chimero’s lesson (issue #1) a tale in which he receives what at the time seems like harsh feedback from someone he’s keen to impress. Having been on the sharp end of rude awakenings myself in the past, I can imagine the pleasure he gets looking back on it, having learned and moved on!

Three beautiful, illustrated hardbound books a year, each holding six articles and six personal lessons that use the maturing of the discipline of web design as a starting point for deeper explorations of our work and who we are as designers.

Aside from the content, the books themselves receive enormous care and attention in terms of production. They’re beautifully bound, printed on sumptuous materials, very nicely designed (obviously) and filled with rich illustrations. Great things to ‘have’.

Win a Year’s Subscription!

The man begin The Manual, Andy McMillan, has kindly offered up a year’s subscription (three issues) to one lucky Webdesigntuts+ reader. So how do you enter?

I want to know what your most valuable life lesson has been. It can be design related, non-design related, strange, obvious, seemingly insignificant even. If it impacted you at the time, or since, I want to know. Tell us in the comments and next Saturday (31st March 2012) I’ll pick which lesson I feel is most deserving of the prize.

Envato Staff or people who’ve contributed more than two tutorials to Tuts+ are not eligible to enter (sorry). Good luck!

 
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Hi there! My name's Ian Yates. Welcome to Webdesigntuts+ :)  

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  • http://www.snaptin.com Ian Yates
    Author

    I’m going to get the ball rolling..

    About eight years ago I had just moved to the Netherlands and was having a tough time of it – work was scarce, I didn’t yet speak the language, the climate wasn’t too cheery, the relationship with my girlfriend was strained, and I had no clue what I was doing, or how I could climb out of my rut. I was pretty miserable.

    I went to visit my Dad in the UK, and when he dropped me back at the airport to fly back to Holland, I asked him (hoping for some spark of genius which would solve all my problems) “What am I going to do?”

    He replied “Well son, you just have to get a grip.”

    I couldn’t have felt more deflated as he left me in departures that rainy February morning, but it was the best advice I’ve ever been given :)

    • http://josephvillajin.com Joseph Villajin

      Most valuable lesson – “How you do anything, is how you do everything.”

      Give everything your all, whether it be design, business, school, or personal because you can only leave a first impression once.

  • Gert Claus

    “Nanakorobi yaoki” (meaning “Fall seven times, get up eight times”) – my Iaido sensei repeated it incessantly to all his new students.

  • http://www.creartinc.com Bilal Khettab

    Design is not how it looks, it’s how it works

  • http://www.benjamin-franck.com Ben

    Here’s the lesson I learned, and the one everyone out there should learn.

    When I was 17, I had to choose something to study, a choice that would lead me to a job. Everyone around me thought about law, architecture, medicine, accounting, marketing, finance etc… I liked photography, and I wanted to live from my passion. So I decided to study photography.

    I Studied for three years in college, got my degree, and found a job in a really nice studio.

    But 4 years later, I discovered desktop publishing. I loved it. Quark Xpress was my new tool. And almost at the same time, I started to have interest for the online version of desktop publishing: web design. I got ‘bored’ of my actual job taking pictures of food, and doing packshots all day to get money and buy food.

    I decided that bieing bored isn’t a life to live, so I decided to take my chances and change my job: get to learn by myself, try things, get stuck, find solutions, learn techniques, and get things done nicely. It was time for me to switch my profgession: get out there and find work, make someone believe I’m able to deliver great material.

    Since then, I never get up in the morning thinking: “I don’t want to go to work, I will end the day hating what I’ve done”

    Since then, I learnd the following lesson: “Find what you like the most, and make it your profession. Never end up going to work if it’s not what you like. If one day you wake up, and don’t think your job is the one you should have: change !”

  • http://schonert.dk Stefan Hans Schonert

    I’ve been thought and learned a lot of valuable life lessons through out my life. All from complicated relationship to simple saying “thank you” lessons. All very helpful, meaningful and inspiring. But the one most significant life lesson I’ve learned, is no doubt, the introduction to personal growth. Since i first learned and realized the importance of personal growth, it’s been an unlimited source to energy, motivation, inspiration and has improved my ability to learn and improve my self through my failures. It’s giving me confidence and self-awareness, I’ve gained the ability to help other people improve in areas, so they can reach their full potential, and it has opened me up for change. I’m no longer afraid of change and I now posses a greater knowledge on where i need and want to change.

    The list of significant changes personal growth has done, is unlimited. it just simply grows for each day, and has with no doubt changed my life for the better.

  • ivascu madalin

    i learned that without hard work,determination ,creativity and motivation you can’t succeed in you’re filed
    the hardest part of doing something is to start doing it!!!

  • Klaudia Balogh

    That which is Below corresponds to that which is Above, and that which is Above corresponds to that which is Below, in the accomplishment of the Miracle of One Thing. And just as all things have come from One, through the Mediation of One, so all things follow from this One Thing in the same way.

    from the Emerald Tablet by Hermes Trismegistus

  • http://www.enteroctopus.com JEan-Philippe Lambert

    I am currently finishing a course and i am gonna get my diploma, i worked hard and sometimes too hard for my own good. I had to work 20 hours a week to pay for the rent and all my needs. Although it would have been a really hard time , someone tought me a great lesson. I was unhappy at my job as a videogame tester i wanted to do more, i felt like my potential was unused, i was feeling depressed. Then one day I talked to her about these problems and how i felt about my life, that i felt i was going nowhere slow and stuff. She told me go do it , anyway im here to help … You see this last year has been really hard financially but i never felt such support from someone.

    Class are over next week, im gonna get my diploma with an average of 93%… Im already working as a developper and im gonna be a dad in august …

    She helped me understand something, you got to follow what your hearth tells you and that if its the good path… everything around you is gonna settle to let you do what you have to do … And real love never counts … it loves

    So when you feel the urge to become what you really are DO IT!

    P.s.: the second life lesson one comes from isaac asimov Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent…

  • Ashley Clarke

    I think the best lesson in life, is to not be afraid of failure but to make sure you learn from it :D

  • Michal

    About 15 years ago I was a homeless guy living in London. I remember I was sleeping in Brockwell Park. I had no money, no friends there and my English was as fluent as my Mandarin. I wanted to get a lot of money and start my own business. Unfortunately my parents couldn’t help me and things in my country wasn’t going well so I decided to go. It wasn’t easy to be an illegal alien, it was hard to get a decent job but I was saving every penny. When I thing about it now the worst thing I remember was lack of soap and water at times :-) but when you are 18 everything seems to be so easy. What I’m trying to say is that a hard work and a bit of optimism is enough to get you wherever you want. Just do it.

  • http://www.dimorgado.com dimorgado

    The best learning ever is “Keep learning!” and must be the first for everybody. I don’t imagine life without learning, cause it always have someone to teach you something you didn’t know so far. Learn from the best :)

  • http://alexismejias.com alex

    I recently adopted a puppy. I have been trying to train him ever since, the most valuable lessons that this has taught me are the three Ps of dog training: Patience, practice and persistence

  • Colin Gibson

    If you enjoy what you do, you’ll never work another day in your life

  • http://www.lukaszwakula.pl Luke Wakula

    For many many years I have been building static sites. On how many jobs ive had ive got bored and bored by editing pages content. Ive tried to learn PHP. Many many time. Unsuccessfully. Ive been depressed every time i didint succeed. Finally a day came. I just googled correct frase. In 5 minutes ive learned how to use tables and databases and how to use php. I was amaized. For around 5 years ive been looking for it. Found it. Even tho i have been working 8 hours at an IT company I would come back home and sit in front of my computer and learn how to code in PHP. After few weeks I started to build my own CMS. Now it uses, php, mysql and jquery.

  • http://www.creartinc.com Bilal Khettab

    Things those I learned cannot be countable …
    But in case of web design, I believe that a user interface isn’t just about design and pretty shapes, is about what a user needs to get the help/pleasure from a specific product.

    • http://www.creartinc.com Bilal Khettab

      And if you’re not making mistakes, rest sure that you are not working hard.

  • uniqueHR

    “If you play with fire, you’ll get burned” – this is, I think, the best advice which can be used in any field for any situation

    Ooh, and of course: “Don’t put anything in the electrical socket!” – should’ve listened to that one… :)

  • Miro Zugovic

    Early on in my career as a web developer, I always wondered if I was doing something the “right way.”

    - (cue the bright light from the heavens)
    My “aha” moment was when I finally realized that there is no “real / one way” to do something. That’s when I stopped searching for the “answer” and began thinking outside of the box. Instructors, employer, etc… never took the time to explain to me that best practices exist. That was the day I realized this line of work was going to be fun. I felt free and threw myself into everything I could get my hands on and began developing my own system that worked for me and the project at hand.

    It made a big difference in my career, and if anyone ever ask’s me “how do I do this?” I always start off by saying “here’s one way of doing it”

  • Dave Haggblad

    I learned this one the hard way, and try to live by it every day. It’s often difficult, but always worth it.

    “If you have the choice to be right or to be kind…….be kind.”

  • http://pablolarah.cl/ Pablo Lara H

    The most valuable life lesson is Persistence. It does not matter your talents or fortune, you have to persist to get what you want. I think all the obstacles in your life are nothing compared to the goal you create as a north to follow. And the success is in the path to get what you want.
    Perseverance. Patience. Resilience.

  • http://ampersandrea.com Andrea Williams

    Mot valuable lesson I’ve learned was actually more of a motto that my Dad and I had. We would always say (in a very particular way) that ‘Everything ALWAYS works out right for me. ALWAYS.’ And I believe it. I live my life this way. Not to say that I don’t have problems or down times…but coming back to that motto and really believing it – makes me feel like…well, quite frankly that everything WILL work out. Especially since my father is no longer here – I hold on to that and I try to share my motto/life lesson with as many people I can.

  • Dimitry

    Since my childhood I was very passionate about computers and computer graphics in particular. I was passionate about both programming and designing, yet the second one was not given a lot of attention for quite a long time. So I became a pro at programming, became a certified engineer and gained a profound experience in the field. And came a time when I was in need of making an interface design for my application. And I did it. Then I was in need of building a website, and at first I needed to design it. And I did it. Not that it was so perfect, yet it was good for a programmer. So I decided to take over the second field also. As you might expect not all attempts were that successful, sometimes I’d met very hard critics that put my design abilities to question so even I was put into doubt, can I be the designer also, and not only the programmer or engineer. And at any time when I met this, I decided to use it as a mean to overcome, to become better, to become more, and to produce better and more mature works. So for now my designs look as (or almost as :)) professional as those made by rockstars, so I even consider of starting writing tutorials on design. As I designer I am self-taught, yet I do this for the money, I do this occasionally for clients and this provides me some extra money which helps a lot since my main income is not that big. Yet I’m going to change that in the near future. So I achieved my dream – to become both the professional programmer and engineer and professional – and capable – designer, and I can use both in order to earn money and in order to get the pleasure out of work.

    So my summary here is that if something looks hard for you and yet you have a strong desire to master it, than just go on and put here your enthusiasm and practice, practice, practice! And if you make errors, that’s perfectly ok! Errors are one of the best material you can use in order to learn something.

  • eric

    don’t eat the yellow snow

  • peter

    “Life is full of risks, the biggest risk of all is not taking any”

  • http://ragnarkarlsson.com Ragnar Karlsson

    I learnt some time ago relaunching a major ecommerce website that actually no matter how many times you ask yourself the question “Will that work?”, you need more opinion. Most importantly that additional opinion should not be just your colleagues, getting a focus group of people outside your office is important. When we launched we were confident the new site was awesome and would make people happy, it wasn’t a disaster but we have had so much feedback since that we simply weren’t close to our expectations.

  • http://decafbad.net Craig Maloney

    The most valuable lesson I’ve learned? Keeping the customer satisfied, even if that means making a PDF, eBook, Kindle, or iPad version of your hipster design manual.

  • http://daniel-swan.com Danny

    In middle school I was fat, had no friends and was used constantly. I wasn’t even really doing anything with my life. The lesson I learned wasn’t to fit in with everyone else but to actually care about making improvement and solving my own problems. Somehow this led to me maturing a lot earlier than the students around me. I took a lot of crap in middle school but it’s made me a better person than I could ever imagine.

  • http://www.leveleddesign.com Marc

    Love is the answer!

  • http://www.irenemaduka.co.uk Irene

    Believe in yourself…nothing is more important.

  • http://andrewgormley.com Andrew Gormley

    I initially wrote two huge paragraphs on what I thought I wanted to say, but decided to pare it down to simple what works best for me: Work hard, be kind, dream big, and laugh often.

  • http://www.medalhost.com Manav

    Double-mindedness is a situation which I often come across in my professional and personal life. Some decisions are worth taking but difficult to execute. How to decide you are right or wrong?

    Once, I had this idea of starting the post-graduation studies while maintaining my full-time job. I thought it would be cool to have the higher qualification while making some bucks. But it turned out to be disastrous. Neither I could satisfy my clients nor I could concentrate on my studies. I was so worried I thought I will lose everything. After banging my head on every wall, I decided to call my Dad and ask for his advise. I called him on phone and explained my situation. He said, “Son, whatever a mind can conceive, body can achieve. If you think it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well”.

    It’s been many years, but his advise still works for me. :)

  • http://www.bookexhibitionism.de Patricia

    Reading all these great comments, I don’t think I have a chance at winning, but this is sort of the lesson I learned when I started blogging a year or two ago. I never expected someone to be interested in what I have to say or in me adding to a conversation. I was also very insecure about my abilities, and compared to the people here, I am again, but I also learned that it’s not always about comparing yourself to others and being the best, most successfull person, though that certainly has it’s upsides, but about just *doing it* and that in order to improve, I just have to give things a try. I’d for example like to be able to create my own wordpress theme from scratch.. I could do it now, but it wouldn’t look like I wanted it to, so I’m working on it, learning stuff here and on other websites, getting my inspiration, improving, and learning stuff again.

    In “real life” I have problems talking about my opinions, and even though I’m not shy, I find it hard to “defend” myself for what I like or dislike. I’ve been reviewing books for the last year, something that is exactly about explaining why you liked something or didn’t and I can see how it helped me realize that a. my opinion is worth something (feedback from readers and authors) and b. that having a different opinion isn’t a bad thing. Same goes for speaking English (which I still am not really good at, but well, it’s getting better.. *grin*) or as I’ve mentioned customizing my theme or stuff like that..

    In short: I have learned through the internet, the community, WordPress and blogging, that if I want to do something, I should try to, and if I like something, it’s worth talking about it, because there might be someone who listens. :)

  • Ernesto Camacho Ramirez

    Well, I’m 17, guess I haven’t learned much about life, but I my age I can clearly say that I’ve understood how I should lead my life, a take it from Einstein for he once said “Only a life lived for others, is a life worthwhile”, seemingly insignificant but it has struck in me a point of view and even a purpose to go about in this world, I love web development and you can sort of figure out how Einstein’s quote fixes in it, I want to give part of me to whom ever wants to take it, and right now web development is the path to go down. Remember “only a life lived for others, is a life worthwhile”.

  • http://kikschua.com Kiks

    I’ve learned that you have to be your biggest fan. If you believe in your work, other will feel the same way. Cheering for Team Me has made me more confident and it shows.

    PS (I want that subscription!!!!)

  • http://kikschua.com Kiks

    I’ve learned that you have to be your own biggest fan. If you believe in your work, other will feel the same way. Cheering for Team Me has made me more confident and it shows.

    PS (I want that subscription!!!!)

  • Pingback: What’s the Most Valuable Lesson You’ve Ever Learned? | Shadowtek | Hosting and Design Solutions

  • Tiago Duarte

    Life is short.

    Spend it doing what you love, with who you love. We will all face death, that’s the one thing we share for sure. So, what better way to spend it than trying to make it worth living?
    Fulfilling your dreams, leaving something behind, being remembered, feeling complete, dying thinking “I did my best, I lived my live to it’s fullest. My job here is done.”

    Life is hard.

    No one said making your dreams come true would be easy. It’s not. In fact, it can be very hard to do so.
    But don’t give up.
    Never give up.
    Giving up means throwing away all you did or could have done.

    This is what I learned.

  • Preston

    I’d say my biggest lesson, in web development and in life in general, is to have the courage to break stuff… repeatedly.

    I’ve learned a lot by doing things such as:

    Plugging a molex connector into a hard drive… backwards… on purpose.
    Replacing a fast blow fuse with a slow blow fuse.
    Overriding a controller.
    Sending out a newsletter to 5000 customers… without using BCC.
    Replacing a capacitor in my old 17″ CRT.

  • http://justadddesign.net John Bussell

    Last year during school I was working as hard as I could to get good grades, so hard that I was so stressed and mentally and physically exhausted that some days I’d be in a deep depression.
    My partner noticed this and he asked me why I was always so upset, and I told him it was because I had to do well so I could qualify for a university course. He then asked me if I actually wanted to go to university… And I didn’t know what to say. He was the only person who’d ever actually asked if I wanted to go and not just assumed that I was…
    He told me that he could tell I wasn’t enjoying school anymore, and that it was time that I stopped listening to what others expected of me and started living my life how I wanted to.

    About 9 months later I’ve left school, moved out of home, I’m studying at TAFE (Australian community college), doing the freelance work I love, and I’ve never been happier :D
    Sometimes all we need is that little push :)

  • Hamid

    ” برای دعای باران در بیابان تنها آن دست کسانی‌ به کار خود ایمان دارند که چتر به همراه خود دارند ”
    its mean: ” Prayer for rain in the desert, only those who believe that their Prays work with their own umbrella.( it was really hard to explaining it as english language so sorry if it wasn’t good, but i hope you get the meaning of it)

    when i want to start something (Especially web design when i started it 1 years ago), this Sentence strongly touch my soul and giving me an energy than i can not explain it even when i don’t have 1$ to start my ideas and working on them.

    Best Regards
    Hamid Mohammadi.

  • Florian

    Never stop being critical about what you make. It’s good to listen to what other people say about your work, but it’s equally important to keep looking for things to improve.
    That’s the only way you can keep improving your skills and, in the end, yourself as well.

  • Mubashar Ali

    Creativity is not the asset of Designers, in fact it’s an asset of human mind. Everyone has the mind can sharpen his or creativity even if he/she is an accountant, lawyer, or engineer. Every field requires creativity.

    Me (an Chartered Accountant) in accountancy field encountered “Design” a year ago when i was inspired by many personal sites (mainly of Professional Designers) and want to create my own personal site. That forced me to enter many learning sites including tuts+ and smashingmagazine. I completed free course of html by tuts+, and read few books related with html and Photoshop.

    About year has elapsed, i have learnt many things but the main thing which i learn in this diverse and creative field which is “Always learn.. Never Skip it”.

  • Bev

    Only one ? There’s been so many but on different fronts. I guess I would say that my first valuable lesson was from the second boss I ever had when I was about 18. I was continually late for work and he pulled me aside one day and told me I was good worker but it was unacceptable to be late. He fired me on the spot. Ever since then I have been at least 10 mins early for whatever commitment I’ve had. (That was 40 years ago). What made this the most valuable was that it was a wake up call that life wasn’t ‘all about me’. I started putting others before myself – it was actually the best thing that ever happened to me.

  • Kelly

    The most valuable lesson I have ever learned is that “You are never too old to be what you might have been.”

    I was always interested in art in all forms, unfortunately my childhood dreams of getting an art degree never came to fruition. That is until at 42 I went back to school to get a degree in Interactive Media/Graphic Design and Photography. I graduated with honors and had the joy of walking in graduation with my oldest son, who was also graduating. My youngest son, then 12, watched with pride as we both got our degrees. What a moment…

  • Nate

    The greatest lesson I ever learned is…
    I am not the actions I make. This might seem contradictory but in reality it is a tremendously liberation revelation. It enables me to make mistakes and receive criticism without condemnation or offence. It isn’t an excuse to do stupid things but rather a way to learn from every situation and approach life more optimistically. Once I realized that mistakes were not my identity I was FREE!

  • Ahmed Ayoub

    “Whitespace is not just empty space!”, Andrea Cima Serniotti

  • Dave

    WOFTBO “Watch Out For The Burn Out” has been my biggest lesson in life!

    In web design a picture is worth at least a thousand words. Choose your pictures with care.

  • Raphi

    “One of our painful problems has a name.
    A first name and a last name.
    It is the combination of two words – ‘Yihyeh B’seder’ ["it will be OK"]…….” — yitzhak rabin

    It goes very good with:

    “God is in the small details”.

  • imho

    If you’re still reading this you’re still to learn THE most valuable lesson …and you’re probably not going to learn it by reading comments on a web design tutorials blog :-)

  • puneet

    Hi,

    Just awsome…..

  • http://www.ghislaingillet.net Gwilain

    When you’re at the dance you must dance.

  • artuross

    The best lesson I’ve ever learned… Hm… Probably when I done to school, but I think I’ve learned nothing from lessons, I’ve learned from friends ;)

    My English sucks, bye :P

  • Stoian Kirovs

    It’s very simple. It can be used in everything.

    Know what you want and work HARD to make your dreams come true. Sooner or later your work is going to pay off! Don’t be lazy!!!

  • http://psawyer.co.uk Peter Sawyer

    The client is always right……..

    Quicker you do what they want. Quicker you get paid. Simple….. even if you despise the work you are producing.

  • SS

    The most important thing I learned is to always keep learning. If you enjoy learning, you will have fun being productive, and you will always attempt new things.

  • Brett

    Function precedes form.

  • http://ninjapowa.com Yee Yang

    My best life lesson is short and sweet:

    “Be content, but never complacent.”

  • Abd-elrouf

    The Best Lesson i’ve ever Learned
    Don’t be afraid of failure always challenge and trust yourself nobody will make you a legend, but you can be a legend !!

  • Gavin

    In business/development:

    “Nothing is impossible. just justify the business and development costs” – Co-workers

    In life:

    Love what you do and do what you love.

  • https://twitter.com/#!/mccommunication/ Matthias Held

    – Never give up! –

    I archivied everything in life by constantly pushing forward, learning and living the learned things. If you want something, work for it, always, everytime.
    Wether in work, love, hobby: “You can get it if you really want” ;)

  • http://n/a Alan

    The most important lesson I ever learned is to have fun. I was an education-obsessed asian(thanks to my parents), when I stumbled upon a realization- what’s the point? Everything you do up to college is just getting a good GPA so you can get a good job and get a good life- but life is short. Philosophers have spent years figuring out the meaning of life- like it’s done anyone any good. Relax. Have fun. Learning is great, and wasting time is bad- just remember to have fun every now and then.

  • http://www.twitter.com/Dom_TC DomTC

    “Do not put off to tomorrow what you can put off till the day after tomorrow”

    Seriously though:

    (I’m 16 now) A few years ago, I went to boarding school for the first time, at the age of 13. It was a huge change for me, I had been at a very small school with around 150 students in it, everyone was a day student. The school I moved to had, in comparison, around 150 students per year, including those who lived over-seas.

    For the first two terms, I, as I expect most people were, was very self-conscious. I am not a very sporty person, the only sport I really enjoy playing is fencing, and I hate football – not a good thing when surrounded by 13-18 year old boys!

    That summer, when picking which sport I was to do for the next term, I decided to choose ‘media’, purely to see what it was like. I ended up loving what I was doing with the media centre. I have met some of my best friends there as well. Choosing to take media as my sport option that summer was a great decision for me,

    I learnt that one should not care to much about what others think of you, don’t be generally irritating and just ignore everyone but don’t be afraid to do something a bit different, “don’t be a sheep” as the saying goes.

  • http://www.giulianoliker.com Giuliano

    Back in 1998 when I started my career as web designer I visited my friend at work. She started showing my latest project to coworkers and everyone was polite and positive. My ego was growing. Then one guy looked at screen and said “I don’t like it. It doesn’t look good”. My ego dropped under the table and I was just thinking how much I hate that guy.

    It took me few years to realize how bad that design was. I learned that I have to pay more attention to blunt and open comments than polite. Since then there were numerous times when listening what others have to say improved my final concepts.

    I still hate that guy.

  • Bruno Mateus

    For me, it has to be that “nothing is ever finished – so adjust yourself to it”. It’s one of my biggest struggles.

    Nothing is static. The web is not static, design is not static, your life is not static. Even the Universe is always changing. Success belong to those who have this ability.

  • Noel Peña

    the best way to live is to express yourself. I would say that is a valuable life lesson.

  • Meg

    “Say Something.”

    Everyone can relate to this (unless you’re in a library, then uh… don’t say something, at least not very loud), whether you’re new to something or a veteran. You’ll never know the answer if you don’t ask the question. Every young lawyer is taught to object, and object often — you might get lucky and win. Don’t like the design? Think it’s an overly complicated script? Speak up and say something.

    This is something I’ve lived by since I was a child. Everyone overlooked my ideas and even if it wasn’t the best idea, I learned to say something because at least I could get some feedback on it. And if it was the best idea ever, well, what can I say? They would have never known if I hadn’t said something.

  • Carolyn L

    My Most Important Life Lesson was the result of a lot of self awareness and reflection I’ve done over the past few months but it was crystallized by an article I read last week in the Wall Street Journal by Laura Vanderkam about how we think our time is spent vs how it’s actually spent.

    I no longer let myself believe I don’t have enough time to do things. I force myself to accept that those things I just “don’t have time for” are really just not a priority to me. And if I don’t like where my priorities are, I change.

    Making myself accept the poor way I spend my valuable time has really breathed new life into my lacking self motivation and self control and brought change into my life.

  • http://parigh.com Ashish

    See the dream and follow them…

  • Michael Fernandes

    the days are short, life is short. KEEP IT SIMPLE!

  • stef

    who won?

    • http://www.snaptin.com Ian Yates
      Author

      Good question Stef – I’m working on it :)

      • http://schonert.dk Stefan Schonert

        Good look! Just read through a few of them, there are some really inspiring ones!

  • Gabriel

    Find time to connect with people, be active, take notice, give and keep learning.

    If you want to go further: mind your words, don’t take yourself so seriously, avoid making suppositions, and do the best you can – but not more!

  • http://josephsergio.com Joe

    About 3 yrs ago when I was doing a summer internship in NYC – we had a meeting with the CEO of the company. His best advice was simply two words – “Common Sense”. He said that with everything in life, sometimes you need to take a few steps back and look at it again and just use common sense, because just as with design – sometimes the most basic idea is the best one!

  • Scott

    I always see people planning for their “future goals”. I, myself, had that issue – and continue to struggle with it at times. Thankfully, one of my best friends told me something that sticks with me til this day. Every time I find myself saying, “I’ll do that eventually” or “I’ll get around to it” or “Maybe next time, but not right now”, I always think back to the advice I was told. The simple advice my friend told me: “This is the youngest you’ll ever be.” Such a simple, short phrase has helped me through many plateaus and busy times in life. It may sound a bit sad at first, but if you truly think about it, the saying means that today is the best day to get out and do what you want. Today is the best day to start a task, complete a goal, and move forward. This thought helps me strive for the best each and every day. For that reason, it’s the best advice I’ve ever received!

  • missrisa711

    The best lesson I think I’ve ever needed to learn is to never stop. It applies to soo many things: trying to loose weight, believing in yourself, studying your craft. If you ever stop and say ok this is the best it’s going to get then that’s where you will stay stagnant for the rest of your life.
    Just thought I’d share since there are soo many great lessons on this page and even if the contest is over it’s nice to look through and be inspired. :)