People in the 18-24 range  have an affinity for asking this particular question. 
“If you could give some advice to your (younger self, __-year-old self, etc), what would it be?”
I have answers, of course. The most important one is that I’d tell myself to start investing in myself earlier and more often. 
But that’s NOT what I want to write about today. 
Because there’s another answer: I wouldn’t want to tell my younger self anything. 
If I could impart all of my 37-years self’s knowledge on 20-years Dre, I would be smarter. I’d be more disciplined. I’d make a several better decisions than the ones that I did make. Maybe I’d be further along in business; perhaps I’d have been a better basketball player. 
But I wouldn’t have had as much fun. 
I wouldn’t touch Bacardi 151 Rum today (if you haven’t, or if you don’t know what that is, keep it that way). Just writing those words, I can remember the feeling of that brown liquor burning as it traveled down my esophagus. 
But without that 151, (some of) the drunk nights of partying and laughing wouldn’t have happened. I bonded with some people who would have never been my friends had I/we been sober — without Banker’s Club and Natural Ice beer to chase it down. 

If I knew then what I know now, I would’ve been smarter in my study habits (not necessarily working harder, but better utilizing my resources)… which would have led to better grades… which might have led me to more opportunities in the “real world” of working for some company that would have offered me a job due to my impressive GPA and college professor recommendations… neither of which I actually had, since I was a bare-minimum-effort student. 
Then you wouldn’t be reading this. 
Had I imparted enough wisdom upon myself, I would’ve had much better nutrition in the days of my youth. Less Little Caesar’s and Pizza Hut and Papa John’s and soda and fries and nuggets and fish sticks.
But, to afford higher-quality cuisine, I would have needed a job, and jobs require time and energy — resources that would have taken away from the fun stuff I was doing otherwise, like partying, playing basketball (my real major in college), and gaining experience in my second college major of Socializing. 
I could go on. Maybe I will in a future post. 

Here’s the main point: we can’t, nor do we need to give advice to our younger selves. 
We needed to be young(er) and dumb(er) because we needed the experience. Even the stupid stuff we did, if we could go back and erase them, the butterfly effect comes into play: change even one little thing about the past, and we might not be where we are now. 
Everything has and does happen as it’s supposed to happen. 
The future on the other hand, we can control. So, be in my live training this afternoon where you’ll learn how I increased my consulting fees over 220% with ONE change in strategy— and how you will too. 
It’s free, and you can register here: http://WorkOnMyGame.com/Live

#WorkOnYourGame 

-Dre Baldwin