1. Cherish your children for what they are, not for what you’d like them to be.
  2. Choose your life’s mate carefully. From this one decision will come ninety percent of all your happiness or misery.
  3. Don’t postpone joy.
  4. Don’t waste time learning the “tricks of the trade.” Instead, learn the trade.
  5. Focus on making things better, not bigger.
  6. Give to charity all the clothes you haven’t worn during the past three years.
  7. Hug children after you discipline them.
  8. Learn to listen. Opportunity sometimes knocks very softly.




  1. Leave everything a little better than you found it.
  2. Lie on your back and look at the stars.
  3. Never admit at work that you’re tired, angry, or bored.
  4. Never cut what can be untied.
  5. Never deprive someone of hope; it might be all they have.
  6. Never give up on anybody. Miracles happen every day.
  7. Remember that a successful marriage depends on two things:(1) finding the right person and (2) being the right person.
  8. Select a doctor your own age so that you can grow old together.
  9. Send your loved one flowers. Think of a reason later.




  1. Skip one meal a week and give what you would have spent to a street person.
  2. Street musicians are a treasure. Stop for a moment and listen; then leave a small donation.
  3. Strive for excellence, not perfection.
  4. Take time to smell the roses.
  5. Tape record your parent’s laughter.
  6. Think big thoughts, but relish small pleasures.
  7. Treat everyone you meet like you want to be treated.
  8. Watch a sunrise at least once a year.