The Eleven Rules of Life

Give this to all the teenagers in your life

RULE 1
Life is not fair - get used to it.

RULE 2
The world won’t care about your self-esteem. The worldwill expect you to accomplish something BEFORE you feel good about yourself.

RULE 3
You will NOT make 40 thousand dollars a year right out of high school. You won’t be a vice president with fancy car* until you earn both.

RULE 4
If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get aboss. He doesn’t have tenure.

RULE 5
Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity. Yourgrandparents had a different word for
burger-flipping. They called it Opportunity.

RULE 6
If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’twhine about your mistakes: learn from them.

RULE 7
Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring asthey are now. They got that way from paying your bills, cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk abouthow cool you are. So before you save the rain forestfrom the parasites of your parent’s generation, try delousing the closet in your own room.

RULE 8
Your school may have done away with winners and losers,but life has not. In some schools they have abolished failing grades and they’ll give you as many times asyou want to get the right answer. This doesn’t bear theslightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

RULE 9
Life is not divided into semesters. You don’t get summers off, and very few employers are interested inhelping you find yourself. Do that on your own time.

RULE 10
Television is NOT real life. In real life people actually go to jobs.

RULE 11
Be nice to nerds. Chances are you’ll end up working for one.

From Charles Sykes book, Dumbing Down our Kids.