One of the easiest ways to invest in something important is simply to say “yes” when it asks you to. A request for your time and attention is a risk, however small – reward it.

My eldest daughter graduated middle school today. I would like to brag for a moment.

She won four different awards, including “Best Overall Student.” She created the class banner, an artistic memento that each class gets to hang permanently in the school – and by “created” I mean both she had the winning concept pitch AND she actually drew & painted the masterpiece. She was in the honor society for academics. She got to deliver a speech, and was the best public speaker on the stage the whole night, and that’s including the adults running the ceremony.

I would also, now that I’m done bragging, like to be humble and honest for a moment: I did none of that.

Parents like to take credit for their children’s accomplishments, and certainly plenty of people congratulated me. But I never did any of her work, never made her do any of her work. I didn’t hound her to do extracurriculars. I didn’t force her to study. Here is what I did do, and I’ll take credit for it: I listened. Every time she was excited about something, I listened eagerly. Every extracurricular she did, I attended all the meetings, games, plays, meets, etc. I was always interested, always impressed. I let her know it was good.

And apparently I did one other thing, taken from the thank-you letter she wrote and delivered to me during the ceremony: “Thank you for always making sure I had everything I needed, even when I needed a lot.”

I love her with all my heart, and I am so very, very proud.

Being accountable is a good thing. You should have to face people tomorrow, always. It keeps you humble, it keeps you diplomatic, and it keeps you connected. Don’t retreat from conflict in a way that eliminates relationships in your life. Learn to live with people.

If you’re paid to do something, it’s easier to do than if you’re not.

I mean the actual task itself gets easier if it’s your job versus if it’s just something you’re doing, particularly for yourself.

Take something like replacing a toilet. If it’s your job, you have dedicated time to do it. You’re not emotionally stressed about it. You’re not worried about it before or after. And you aren’t scrambling to find the time to do it – or dealing with the fallout of other missed responsibilities because this took priority. Those factors, the stress, the worry; they make any job more difficult, even if you have the same training.

It’s good to simulate that in your own life if you can. Build room to deal with emergencies as a professional would, not as a stressed individual. It’s not always possible, but the real lesson is keeping your life from being too overfull.

Always remember that stress compromises performance. You can withstand a certain amount of it, but diving deeper into it will slow the progress you’re making. You have to mitigate those forces, not just endure them.

Imagine yourself as a jigsaw piece. The more you look for pieces you fit with, the better your life will be. The more you look at pieces that are just like you, but bigger, the worse your life will be.

The piece that’s shaped like you, but bigger? That’s for a different puzzle. It has nothing to do with you. It can’t help you, because you can’t help it.

Joy and success in life comes from finding people we can help, and doing so. Look for people who are missing what you have, and who have what you are missing. Look for ways to form connections, not comparisons.

That bigger piece, to a different puzzle? It’s taking nothing from you; the pieces that it fits with don’t even belong to your puzzle. You gain nothing from even being aware of it, unless you’re using it as inspiration to find other pieces to fit with.

Don’t look for people like you. Look for people who will like you.

Oddly, I seem to frequently see people touting how much money they’ve spent on something as if it were something to brag about. I’m well aware of conspicuous consumption and all that, but usually that doesn’t include also bragging that you’re a sucker.

Whether it’s a neighbor talking about how much they paid to send their kid to school or the local town hall bragging about how much they’re spending on new infrastructure, the point seems to be lost. It’s not how much you’re paying – it’s what you get for it!

Remember the old adage, “Better, Faster, Cheaper: Pick Two?” The wisdom is that usually deciding between two options means sacrificing one of those three (and if you’re losing on 2, it’s a bad deal). A different landscaper might do a better, faster job than the one you have now, but they’re more expensive. That’s fine to go with, but what you’re supposed to brag about is how nice your yard looks, not how much money you spent!

The things you do for yourself are often beneficial to others, too. And since you’ve already done them, the cost of sharing them is very low!

If you’ve solved a particular problem for yourself, created a helpful spreadsheet for something, figured out a tricky home repair problem, etc. – share it! Take a picture or write it down, maybe even make a video. You never know who’s day you’ll save!

Medicine is marvelous. Cheers to the doctors, scientists, production facilities, and all the other elements of the system that make medicine possible.

Pad Thai is also great.

I hate being sick.

I think it’s really fantastic when someone loves something as a kid and then, as an adult, gets an opportunity to meaningfully interact with it in some way.

I recently saw the band Kansas perform live. This band has been around for more than 50 years, so as you’d imagine, the lineup has changed many times. At least one of their members was a fan of the band as a child, and being able to grow up and join that band has got to be incredible.

Taylor Swift got to do a song in Toy Story 5. When she performed live with Randy Newman, she brought her VHS copy of Toy Story (1) that she’d watched many times as a child and had Newman sign it.

When I was a kid, I played a ton of a unique role-playing game and more than 20 years later, I’m a published author for that game.

These kinds of things are not only great to see from the personal level, but they’re amazing to see writ large on society. The passing of torches and the evolution of culture, the way we can care about things together even across generational divides, all this is wonderful.

Look back on your youth. What did you care about then? What was special to you? Could you experience it again in a new way, today? I’ll bet you could – come full circle.