Life Advice From A 22-Year-Old Hunter S. Thompson

At the age of 22, in 1958, Hunter S. Thompson responded to his friend Hume Logan regarding Logan’s request for life advice.

And it was at the age of 22 when I received the link to this letter from a friend.

Similar to Logan, I felt in a place of uncertainty — I felt I had no direction.

In reading this letter, you can begin to feel a sense of relief, a weight being lifted; Thompson briefly explores existentialism as he focuses on the individual and our meaning in this life, opposing the ideas that we must follow prescribed ways of living.

The letter may not answer your questions, but it does offer a different perspective to approach those questions: so below I have focused on five elements of the letter which have helped me when I feel a bit lost.

No One Else Can Tell You What You Want

“To presume to point a man to the right and ultimate goal — to point with a trembling finger in the RIGHT direction is something only a fool would take upon himself.”

It’s at the very start of the letter to his friend Logan that Thompson points out that he himself is not qualified to answer Logan’s question regarding “What should I do with my life?”

Time and time again, we hear of stories where individuals followed the advice of their family members, friends, teachers — others who influence their life — to find themselves climbing a ladder that they don’t wish to be on, to walk a path in the opposite direction of where their heart lies.

It’s in this world, where Keeping Up With The Joneses is on the minds of many, where we are told by others what the best thing to do is: to go to University, which leads to getting a good job, followed by plenty of promotions, and somewhere amongst that we find a partner and have a family — we work until retirement and then we live on our pension enjoying cruises and relaxing before we end up six feet under.

I’m not the only one who feels this way of life, one which has been drilled into us from childhood, does not fit with the way I feel I should live my life; it feels restricting.

But, as Thompson says, only a fool would tell someone else how to live their life.

We are all individuals, with our own set of experiences, different circumstances, own ambitions, dreams, and interests — and so how can anyone else tell you how to live your life?

They could advise, they could offer suggestions, but to provide a goal?

Well, there is no one on this Earth who is qualified to do that but yourself.

Change Is Inevitable

“Every man is the sum total of his reactions to experience. As your experiences differ and multiply, you become a different man, and hence your perspective changes. This goes on and on. Every reaction is a learning process; every significant experience alters your perspective.”

Is there food which you used to love as a child but you now can’t stand the taste of?

I used to love Babybel cheese as a child, but at some point in my life my tastebuds changed and I could no longer stomach them one bit.

Or perhaps you have the opposite when you were a child your diet used to consist solely of chicken and rice, and now you enjoy cuisine from all over the world, the mix of flavours dancing on your tongue.

It’s in this, perhaps odd example, that shows you that you change during your life, if you didn’t know that already.

And not only does our body physically change: being able to stomach more food and drinks, growing facial and pubic hair as we transition from childhood to our pubescent teenage years — our minds change as we learn more through school, as we live through different experiences, and as we begin to dive into different topics of interest.

We tend to live each day understanding who we are; we think we know what we like, what we dislike, what our interests are — but in reality, we have so much we haven’t tried and each day we change so our dislikes may become our likes.

During my school years I was not a fan of physical education — slightly overweight and always the last to be picked, I had no motivation or desire to invest my time into any sports.

It’s only in the last year that I decided to give running a go, no longer pressured by teachers or peers, able to run at my own pace and in my own time.

It’s in this experiment I tried with myself that I realised I enjoyed running: loving the feeling of being in the moment, taking each step at a time, and also pushing myself to the edge of my ability.

Over time your goals may change, you may find new things you enjoy doing that you want to invest more time in, you may read or see something that opens a new door of possibilities.

Every day we change, and over time we change drastically, so our goals as a child will most likely no longer be our goals now — and that’s expected, just don’t try holding on to who you were or try to mould yourself into your old goal as it may not align with who you are now.

We Care About Our Individual Meaning

“In every man, heredity and environment have combined to produce a creature of certain abilities and desires — including a deeply ingrained need to function in such a way that his life will be MEANINGFUL. A man has to BE something; he has to matter.”

If we look at the philosophy of Existentialism, we can understand that humans are always asking themselves, or at least trying to answer, the age-old question: “Why am I here?”

This is not a new phenomenon; humans want to have a reason for their existence.

However, as we have reached this technological age, where tasks that used to feel meaningful have now been replaced by robots and automatic systems, we find ourselves working in jobs that seem to only focus on making the owner of the company more money — rather than providing value to others and the world around us.

What may surprise you though, is that you can find meaning without being a multi-millionaire philanthropist or a social media influencer.

If you look through history, you will find the likes of Martin Luther King, Lucy Stone, and Marsha P. Johnson who all stood up and become voices for important movements for societal change — in this, they created their meaning; to stand up for what they believe in and create change for the good of many.

But on the other side, we could look at the life of a caregiver; they use their day to spend time with either an elderly person or a person with learning disabilities or mental health problems — in the wider world their efforts go unseen, but for that person, well, they make the world a nicer place to live in.

They have found their meaning in helping another person.

It is in the book ‘Man’s Search For Meaning’ that Viktor Frankl goes into depth about the mindset of the prisoners of the WW2 concentration camps — those that found meaning in something, usually, a future to believe in were able to survive each day rather than succumbing to the situation they were in and physically giving up hope of a future beyond that day.

It’s in finding out own meaning that we find our fulfilment.

Goals Are Not As Important As A Lifestyle

“But beware of looking for goals: look for a way of life. Decide how you want to live and then see what you can do to make a living WITHIN that way of life.”

From this I recall the idea of New Year’s Resolutions — we set goals such as; reading X amount of books, earning X amount of money, or getting back our summer body — these goals being result-focused.

But what happens when we reach those goals?

Or, what happens when we don’t?

By being result-based, we think less about the process of reaching the goal, and more about the quickest way to get there.

Life isn’t a sprint.

Instead of setting goals that focus on results, we could be trying to implement daily changes in our lives which build our lifestyle, living the way we wish to live.

Instead of trying to read 52 books in a year, focus on being a reader — setting up a habit of reading each morning and evening.

Focusing less on the speed and quantity, and more on the quality.

Focus more on how you want to live, how you want to spend your time, and what you invest your energy on.

When it comes to living a lifestyle instead of focusing on goals, I think of YouTubers.

Take gamers — they love gaming, but unfortunately, gaming doesn’t pay.

Or at least it didn’t — now gamers can play games daily, edit their videos and upload them to YouTube — over time they build an audience and a community, earning an income from ad revenue or subscriptions/patrons.

It’s in this that they can live the lifestyle they want to whilst earning a living.

If You Don’t Decide, Someone Else Will

“A man who procrastinates in his CHOOSING will inevitably have his choice made for him by circumstance.”

Often you hear the story of someone who wants to quit their corporate job and work somewhere more creative, more fulfilling — but each year they say “I’ll leave after my bonus”, and then they never quit because next year’s bonus which is so much better.

It’s in this scenario where someone else is dangling a carrot in front of you, being led by the person taking you for a ride, rather than deciding your own direction.

If you don’t make choices, if you don’t take risks, you find yourself following someone else’s plan, you end up being dictated to as to how you spend your time.

No longer are you the captain of your own ship, but cabin crew on someone else’s.

Don’t let your opportunities slip by you because you were unable to decide — the waiting and indecision will only lead you down a path you don’t recognise, a path far from the one that leads to fulfilment, far away from where your heart lies.

In his letter to his friend, Thompson highlights certain mindsets and philosophies which we can all absorb and remember in our own lives when we begin to feel a bit lost.

Thompson focuses on several key points:

• You will change over time — don’t hold on to who you were
• Build a lifestyle you love rather than focusing primarily on goals
• Only you know what your heart desires
• Someone else will decide how you should live if you don’t
• We want to find meaning in this life, but this is unique to us

Click here to check out the entire letter.