What I Wish Someone Had Told Me 30 Years Ago

In 1990, I was among the most unremarkable, underachieving, unimpressive 19-year-olds you could have stumbled across. Stoned more often than studying, I drank copious amounts of beer, smoked Camels, delivered pizza. My workouts consisted of dragging my ass out of bed and sprinting to class—usually late and unprepared.

My high-school guidance counselor had had good reason to tell my deflated parents that there was no way I was college-bound: I graduated in the bottom third of my 100-person class at Lourdes Academy in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. I had to attend the Menasha extension of the University of Wisconsin, a two-year school, just to smuggle myself into the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh, a four-year school in my hometown. A year into that, I was staring at a 1.491 GPA and making the guidance counselor’s case daily, unambiguously, emphatically. I was one more wasted—literally and figuratively—semester away from getting the boot.

Then I stumbled into a pair of passions: journalism and politics. Suddenly I had an intense interest in two new-to-me things that, for reasons I cannot fully explain, came naturally. My twin interests were animated by my innate mischievousness, contrarian impulses, long poker nights, antiestablishment snobbery, and ease with people of all stripes at dive bars. These passions launched me on a wild, wholly unforeseeable ride through presidential impeachments and congressional coups, aboard Air Force One, onstage moderating a presidential debate, inside an Oval Office lunch with Donald Trump, on TV, and at the helm of two successful media start-ups: Politico and Axios.

Thirty years later, I am running Axios, and fanatical about health and self-discipline. My marriage is strong. My kids and family seem to like me. I still enjoy beer, and tequila, and gin, and bourbon. But I feel that I have my act together more often than not—at least enough to write what I wish someone had written for me 30 years ago, a straightforward guide to tackling the challenges of life.

[Robert Waldinger and Marc Schulz: What the longest study on human happiness found is the key to a good life]

An inherent hubris comes in offering this kind of advice, as I do in my new book, Just the Good Stuff. You naturally come off as arrogant or a know-it-all. I am acutely aware of the kind people, awesome family, and twists of fate that landed me here. And I am like so many others: an imperfect, middle-of-the-pack, small-town guy who worked hard, who never lost sight of life’s serendipity, who feels blessed to share with others what others—or life’s face slaps—shared with me.

It is nonsense that to shine, you need to go to a fancy school, bootlick bosses, or pay your dues at soul-sucking jobs working for bad people. You do not need to get 1500 on your SAT or to have a sky-high IQ or family connections. You don’t even need sparkling talents. You simply need to want to construct goodness with whatever life throws at you. This starts by grounding yourself with unbreakable core values and then watching, learning, and copying those who do it—and get it—right. But it also includes watching and studying those who screw it up. You need to find your own passions, not have them imposed by others. Then outwork everyone in pursuit of shaping your destiny—your own personal greatness—on your terms, by your measures, at your pace.

My own life is littered with mistakes. But I learned something from every dumb move and used it to try to get the big things right. Five decades in, that is what matters most to me: cutting myself slack on my daily sins or stumbles so I can focus on the good stuff.  

[Read: How to succeed at failure]

For me, that list includes pursuing deep, meaningful, unconditional relationships with my kids; a healthy, resilient marriage; strong, loving relationship with my parents and siblings; a few deep and durable friendships; faith and connection beyond myself; and doing consequential work with people I enjoy and admire.

I’ve often fallen short of these goals, and so I’ve learned the value of grace. We’re all deeply flawed, wounded, selfish, clueless, and mean at different times. It does not make us bad. It makes us normal. That’s why we need to extend grace to others, and to ourselves.

I have blown many months beating myself up for being a selfish husband or an inattentive son or a harsh leader or an absent friend. And all of those things were often true. But life is not measured by a moment. In the end, I want to be able to say what we should all be able to say about ourselves: I learned a little every day, tried to do the next right thing, and got the big things right.

This article has been adapted from Jim VandeHei’s new book, Just the Good Stuff.