Ten Tips for Life (a gift to you on my birthday)

"Let us not take ourselves too seriously. None of us has a monopoly on wisdom."

- Queen Elizabeth II

Today is the 23rd anniversary of my 29th birthday, a/k/a my 52nd birthday, and I am writing to you from the beach.  My husband surprised me about 6 weeks ago, telling me we should go to the beach for a week in September. We are big fans of a little town on the Gulf coast of Florida called Navarre Beach.  We have been coming here since our son was little, so this is one of our favorite places on earth.  I’m so glad we were able to come for my birthday week, it was just what we both needed.  Today is our last day, and my hope is that we will be outside, on the beach, soaking up every last moment.  (I’ll be sharing a trip report of Navarre and Destin next week that I hope you will enjoy!)

 As I was working on this list, I came across the quote from Queen Elizabeth shown above, and it made me laugh.  I am a fixer, I like to try and fix things, people even.  I have incredible empathy for people, and if I have what is even remotely a possible solution to your problem, you are going to hear about it.  It comes from a good place, I truly want to help.  But also, I had what you could say was an unusual upbringing, from about age eleven. I didn’t have a lot of adults speaking into my life or giving me advice or even direction.  I craved wisdom and stories of experience then and had to figure out a lot on my own, and along the way I made a lot of mistakes. So today, I am the one who offers up usually unsolicited advice.  I don’t think I have reached the point of this being a toxic trait just yet. Hopefully someone will let me know when I get there, or I will learn to bite my tongue more often.

When I thought about sharing a list of tips for my birthday, I knew that I did not want to come off like an advice columnist, or a know-it-all. I did, however, want to provide some carefully thought-out ideas that have truly helped me in life and relationships.  In fairness, many of these I have only come to fully realize the value of in the last 10 or so years.  Most importantly, these “tips” are actually lessons that I have learned firsthand, most of which were incredibly painful, embarrassing or humbling. I may have heard or read some iteration of these nuggets of wisdom, but most likely, I only learned these the hard way. I hope that you take something valuable away from these tips, or that they resonate with you and give you pause in the future.

 Jeannine Kennedy’s Top Ten

Tips for Life:

1)    If you need to have a difficult conversation with someone, do it in person.  This one is hard, but I honestly believe that I am still friends with some people today because I made this a personal practice many years ago.  If distance is an issue, and you can’t meet in person, ask them to schedule uninterrupted time with you for a facetime call.  Whatever you do, don’t text or email.  We have more keyboard warriors than we will ever need in this world, and so much context can be lost without face-to-face connection. 

Let’s take the “keyboard warrior” theory one step further. Don’t comment to someone on social media anything that you would not say to their face if they were standing right in front of you.  Most likely, you will not change their mind, AND you will end up looking very small to others who read the posts.  How many of us have had our day RUINED by someone who commented negatively on social media? (Hands raised!). Don’t be the person responsible for ruining another human’s day.

2)    One practice that has served Corkey and I will in marriage is that we each try to out-do the other.  Let me explain. The Apostle Paul was on to something in his letter circa 57-58 C.E. written to the people of Rome, “Be devoted to one another in love.  Honor one another above yourselves.” Marriage isn’t a competition, but if I am faithfully looking after my husband, and he is faithfully looking after me, we find that things are pretty harmonious in our house.  My husband’s happiness is at least 50% of my happiness, sometimes more, right?  So truly his happiness is my happiness and vice versa.  This often looks a lot like teamwork in our house.  It’s the end of the day, we are both tired, so we both clean up the kitchen.  Then we are both able to sit down and rest.

3)    Another marriage tip:  Early in our marriage, I decided to make a concerted effort to NOT speak negatively of my husband to ANY friends.  I noticed that once a friend complained at length to me about her husband, I didn’t care for him much anymore.  Even though I only heard one side of the story and probably heard this from my friend on a bad day, the damage was done.  I never wanted anyone to feel that way about my husband, so I determined then and there to keep my mouth shut.  If I am frustrated with him, I go to him, not to anyone else.  Jokes are another matter, I will tell anyone who will listen how terrible my husband is at loading the dishwasher, or what a penny-pincher he is. In turn, he will gladly tell you how terrible I am at cutting grass or how I spend too much money on, well, EVERYTHING. Hey, we have to laugh, right? 🤣

4)    People will show you who they are. You need only sit back, watch and listen.

5)    I love this quote from Lisa Terkeurst: “The words we say about others speak volumes about us.” Be careful of friends who gossip to you about your other mutual friends. Chances are very high they will gossip about you too.  (Also, see tip #4)

6)    Leave margin in every single day for unexpected occurrences.  If you pack your day full from start to finish, you have zero margin for anything beyond the tasks.  What if you need to have a good cry?  What if life calls for a spontaneous celebration?  What if your spouse or child needs your full attention?  Leave room for life in your day.

7)    Plan your day the night before.  Think about what you will make for dinner tomorrow, set out your clothes for tomorrow, pack your work bag or make a to-do list.  Your brain will “work out” those plans for the next day while you sleep, you’ll wake up focused and ready.  Additionally, you will save yourself precious time by doing even the smallest task, such as what to wear.  When I worked in corporate and outside the home, I would plan my outfits for the whole week every Sunday afternoon.  Sounds like overkill, I know, but it saved me 15 – 20 minutes every morning.  I still do it to this day on the night before an early morning meeting.

8)    Personality will get you in the room, hard work will keep you there and character will reserve you a seat at the table.  Kindness (personality) is noticeable in today’s world, let it open a door for you.  Being willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done (hard work) will get you noticed, for sure.  I have a policy for my event planning business, we will be the first to arrive on site and the last to leave.  If that means that we take out the trash that a caterer forgot so that my client doesn’t get charged a trash fee, then we take out the trash.  Being dependable, honest and without ego (character) will keep you on the mind of others.  This idea applies to business, but I think it applies in relationships as well.

9)    Sleep is the most underrated self-care practice there is.  While there is honor in being a hard worker, doing so without sleep is not sustainable.  You deserve to sleep, you NEED good sleep - women especially.  We need one to two more hours of sleep than men and we all need more sleep as we get older.  On a good night, I sleep for nine hours, and when I do, I can take on the world the next day.  My husband is usually good with seven hours, and occasionally, he needs eight.  Don’t believe me about the importance of sleep?  Try me…make sleep a priority for one week and watch your health improve, your focus and discipline grow stronger, and your problem solving and creativity soar.

10) Take the high road – there’s less traffic.  That is part joke, part truth.  Sometimes, taking the high road looks like saying you’re sorry when you didn’t really do anything wrong but you want to de-escalate someone.  Sometimes that looks like being quiet when you are seething inside because someone was just incredibly rude to you. Sometimes that looks like completely ignoring someone who just cut you off in traffic.  Most often for me, taking the high road means saying as little as possible, or sometimes not speaking at all, which is incredibly hard for me to do.

What about you - what is the single best piece of advice someone has given you? I’d love to know! Best wishes to each of you in all that you do, and a big thank you if you are a regular reader of this blog. Your support and friendship makes birthdays worth celebrating!