Great Advice I’m Extremely Thankful For

We’re bombarded by opinions and advice every single day. On your phone, on TV, from family, friends, and colleagues, it comes at you from all directions from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep. Sometimes it’s impossible to know how to separate good from bad advice. I’ve know I’ve followed both.

On a day like today though, it’s nice to look back at some pieces of advice that have made a lasting impact on my life and be grateful for them and the person who delivered it.

Here are three great pieces of advice I’ve received:

1) “Be an Anesthesiologist.”

Back in medical school I was on track to be a surgeon. However, there was a moment I wavered and I asked the chief resident in surgery for his advice. He told me, “if you can see yourself doing anything else, you should fully explore it” and he suggested that I at least check out Anesthesia.

Well I did look into it, and I discovered that the anesthesiologists were some of the happiest doctors in the hospital. It made such an impression on me that I followed them right into the field. I couldn’t have made a better choice of profession for myself. I love what I do and the people I work with.

Thanks Chief Resident!

2) “Buy a house now.”

My wife and I initially thought we’d wait until we started a family to purchase a home. However in 2011, my accountant told me that this would be an ideal time to buy because of depressed prices and we’d benefit significantly from the tax deductions.

Well, based on her advice we decided to start looking, and we fell in love with one of the first places we saw. We bought it and five years later it’s doubled in value. Of course that doesn’t mean anything unless we sell, however, if we wanted to buy this home today, we wouldn’t be able to afford it. This isn't the right advice for everyone at any given time, however we got extremely lucky with our timing.

Thanks Accountant!

3) “To enjoy life, you don’t need fancy nonsense, but you do need to control your time…”

This is a quote from the Tim Ferriss book, The 4-Hour WorkWeek. At one point, success to me meant making a good deal of money and owning a lot of nice things, but because of this book and a few other influential people, I began to realize that the most valuable thing in the world is time.

When you’re able to control your time, you can spend it with the people you love, doing the things you love. Since then, I’ve become extremely hungry for time freedom and that’s driven me to pursue multiple passive income streams.

Thanks Tim Ferriss!