6. Learn how to say no.

Maybe you’re just a nice guy. Maybe you help your friend at work do his tasks because he throws great parties and you hope you’ll get invited. Maybe you let those annoying frenemies hang around because they have hot sisters you hope to bang. Maybe you drive your hot neighbor everywhere she asks you to because she doesn’t have a car and you hope being nice will get you noticed. Guess what? The guy at work will never invite you, the shitty friend talks shit to your face AND to his sister, and that hot neighbor just friendzoned you. It’s great to be dependable—if your best friend is moving this weekend, help him—but don’t be so freely dependable that you let other people use you. Be selfish. Say no. Your time is valuable, and if s/he isn’t returning that value, say no. Don’t roll over and perform tricks on demand.

7. Take a risk.

I question your sanity if your idea of a risk is car surfing, but by and large risks are awesome and exciting. Move to another state, another country. Take an unplanned vacation. Quit your job. Ask out a random hot girl. Take a road trip without a map. If you’re a plain, average guy who eats his Wheaties for breakfast, goes to work in a cubicle farm, and drives his Honda Civic home every single day with no change in his routine, you’re going to have a boring life.

If you want excitement, you have to MAKE excitement. If you go into 2015 with the same routine and attitudes as 2014, you’re going to repeat history, so you better hope you had an awesome year or you need to start changing things up.

8. Stop procrastinating.

Everyone has something they’ve been dying to do. Maybe you want to go back to school and get another degree. Maybe you want to take up Crossfit. Maybe you’d love to learn archery. Whatever makes you happy, do it. But every year that you sit back and wonder how much more money you’d be making with that degree, how hot you’d look with abs, or how awesome it would be to be able to shoot a bow and arrow like a badass Mongol warrior, that’s another year you’re going to spend broke, fat, and bored. Stop waiting for the “right time”. There’s no such thing. You don’t have to wait for January to start your resolution or August to start applying for college, so stop delaying your self-improvement.

9. Cross something off your bucket list.

This goes hand in hand with #8. Maybe you’d love to go skydiving. Maybe you’ve always wanted to watch a UFC match in person. Maybe you’d love to climb a mountain. But you put these things off. It’s a distant dream you’d like to accomplish someday, but right now you prefer to just focus on your career knowing that eventually you’ll get to it. Eventually. Then one day you wake up at the ripe old age of 70, retired after a long and industrious career, to find out that you never actually lived and now your biological clock isn’t just ticking, it’s a countdown. It might be risky to take a week off of work to go climb Mount Kilimanjaro, but it’s a life experience worth having and at the very least you’ll walk away with an awesome conversation piece.

10. Don’t hesitate.

If procrastination is putting off until tomorrow something that you could get done today, then hesitation is retreating into the corner whenever something unfamiliar, difficult, or frightening comes up. It’s natural to want to back away when you’re faced with something you don’t know, but hesitating can cost you a lot. Hesitating to ask out the girl you’ve been eyeing is going to get her hooked up with someone else. Hesitating to ask your boss for a raise is going to see that dick who dumps his work on you get promoted. If you see something you want, need, or deserve, go after it. Now. Don’t let the opportunity pass you by or fall into someone else’s hands. 2015 is the year to think about Y-O-U.

Have dating questions you want to ask Miss Cindy Young? Email her – [email protected]