I like how some of the comments here completely ignore who Pieter Levels is. "Some blogger", LOL. I suggest you check out what he's created before simply poo-poing his advice.<p>Regarding said advice, here's my take; his post is about exactly what the title said - what HE would do if HE was 18 right now.<p>From my reading of him, he's an extremely independent, entrepreneurial-type who would not be interested in being employed by others(hence him suggesting you skip college). You need a fancy degree to get fancy corporate jobs, not to start lifestyle businesses.<p>Regarding learning how to code as soon as possible - I think that's good advice for most people who want to make things. Sure, you won't get that job at FB or Dropbox, but I have a feeling Pieter knows himself well enough to not even consider those as options.<p>Building an income. Yes, simply "producing" a business making $5K pm is, shall we say... optimistic. But it's still good advice for independent-minded people. It's a target to reach for. A prompt to at least attempt that goal. It's better advice than "get an unpaid intern position for a year."<p>Move and travel. That's easier for young people from rich countries, which, well, would apply to an 18 year old Pieter too. If I had been young and unattached with a currency advantage like that, yeah, I'd be out traveling too! Life experiences can teach you a lot about yourself.<p>Save and invest. Solid advice. You may disagree with his assumptions and math, but how many 18-year-olds even think of saving and investing money, never mind the amounts he suggests?<p>Follow your passions. Yeah, that's a bit pie-in-the-sky for me too, but to his credit, he does say that that would follow after you've accomplished his earlier advice(Build a business with a lot of income, ect.)<p>I enjoyed his post. And I suspect you'd enjoy it more too if you took the time to know more about the man who wrote it.
People forget how much more free time and freedom there is at college. Yes, there are deadlines and schedules but you’re given opportunities that the usual 40 hr/wk job won’t afford. You could take student loans out to buy yourself dumb things, for sure, but you can also take student loans out for really good things, too. The rest of your life that won’t so easily be the case. I would love to have the time flexibility I had at college now that I’m “in the industry”.
Who are all these people who "didn't learn anything" from university? What were they spending their time doing? I learned a ton about a wide variety of fields from experts in those fields; it was extremely valuable. Did this guy just goof off the whole time?
> Happiness comes from intangibles, like experiences, relationships, activities, not stuff.<p>Experiences don't make you happy. It's one of the mistakes millennials make. Vacations are exactly the same as buying shit - you're just buying more shit, except your buying a pre-packaged consumer-friendly vacation. Taking a vacation to south of France isn't going to make you happy. You'll be just as angsty there as you are in your current place - don't need the south of France or Machu Picchu to tell you your life is empty.<p>My advice: Create.<p>That's happiness right there.<p>If you want experiences that result in happiness, create some new experience. You know you're doing it right if you actually make the news - when someone ELSE gives a shit about your experience enough to report about it.<p>The actual process of creating something new is what makes you happy.
> If you save that $3k/m over 20 years and put it into Vanguard ETFs (at 7% over 20 years), you’ll be 38 and have $1.5 million in the bank! Save $6k/m, and you’ll have $3 million at 38. Yes, I said that correctly. Save $1k/m and you’ll have $500k by 38.<p>Simply, no. No. That's not how it work. You can't find index returning 7% avg on 20 year interval. Plus that gains are taxable in many contries, sometimes heavily.
Don't waste your life on some shit. Learn! Learn! Learn! Develop skills! Learn programming! Work with smart people and learn from them! Measure your progress in KPI! Learn how to be useful for other people and solve their problems! Be persistent and not give up easy!
> This will probably learn you more about objectification and empathy.<p>'probably *teach you'.<p>Actually the lesson from going to strip-clubs is don't be a chump. In most cases the one on the losing side of the transaction is the dude handing over cash in exchange for literally nothing. Like paying to watch somebody eat a burger.<p>> Age is a social construct.<p>Wut?<p>Agree with the learn to dance, write, code, love and socialize bit. Your 20's should be an exercise in sucking less each day. Shit, your whole life should be this.
Demonstrates the easiest way to success. Just tell others how to be successful - live a crazy life that seems awesome and blog/write about it! Pretend you know something they don't so they stay hooked on your "personal brand". Voila!
>create a business that makes 5k usd per month<p>Ok, cool. How many people who legitimately set out to do that, actually accomplish that?<p>>save 3k per month and invest it in ETFs, and you will have 1.5m by age 38<p>Ok, so if i'm making 5k USD per month, 1k goes to tax, and 1k as you say goes to living, now I'm just barely at 3k. 20 years ago, the market was at a relative nadir. Today it is at an apex, so you will need to time it correctly to achieve 7% yearly gains (!), of which 2% will be lost to inflation.<p>Given that 0.7% of the world are millionaires, and just 4-5% of the USA are millionaires, I have a sneaking suspicion that it is not so easy to just set up this business and invest everything for 20 years, willy nilly, hey ho presto I'm a millionaire.<p>Thesd numbers are further compounded by the fact that most money in this country is "old money", which means that those who are rich currently inherited their wealth rather than built a business that generated this wealth for them.<p>So forgive me if I am a bit skeptical, but I really don't like to see business advice overly simplified so that people will risk their time effort and money to succeed, when failure rates are actually extremely high.<p>Day trading has a 95% chance of failure. A business has 90%.<p>If you don't have a product, a team, a funding runway, and aloof competition... then you are going to lose all of your money as an 18 year old startup founder.