ificoulddoitover

"If you could sit with your 25 year old self for just five minutes, what advice would you give — and why?"

📖 Read the Top 100 Most Interesting Answers →

"If you could sit with your 25 year old self for just five minutes, what truths about love, purpose, and happiness would you want them to know — and why?"

Through this project, we invite you to share your reflections, lessons learned, and the wisdom you’ve gained over the years. Every insight helps create a space to guide and inspire others.

A Life Well-Lived

by Chris Ellison
therapist and author

A brand new book on the nine areas of a good life and how to keep each one strong. Is your own house standing tall, or does a pillar need some attention?

How’s your house holding up? →

The book is coming soon. Learn more about A Life Well-Lived, and get a free first chapter →

Why This Project Matters

When life stops working, most of us try to fix it alone first. A relationship that has gone cold. A feeling of being stuck. A pattern that keeps repeating. For nearly thirty years I have sat with people at exactly that point, and what helps is rarely complicated. It is practical, it is specific, and it can start today.

That is why I started the Wisdom Harvest. I asked thousands of people what they would tell their 25-year-old selves, and the same nine areas of life kept coming up. Their answers, together with my own work, became the tools and the book A Life Well-Lived. If you are stuck on something right now, start with the free five-minute walk through your house. And if you have hard-won wisdom of your own, add your voice below. It may be exactly what someone else needs to hear.

See the top 100 answers now →

The Journey Toward a Life Well-Lived

Chris Ellison, BSW, MSW, MBA

For nearly thirty years, people have come to me when something in their life stopped working. Most of them had already tried to fix it on their own. What I have learned is that feeling stuck is rarely a flaw in who you are. It is usually a missing tool, a missing piece of understanding, or a first step nobody ever showed you.

I bring a Master of Social Work, an MBA, and half a lifetime of real-world experience to this work. I see a good life as a “recipe”: a tangible set of principles that anyone can learn and use, whether the problem is a marriage that has gone quiet, a pattern you cannot break, or a life that feels smaller than it should.

I believe in high-definition and on-purpose living. Whether I was soaring in formation with the Canadian Snowbirds, photographing grizzlies in the wild, or producing a new song in the studio, my time as a photojournalist and musical artist taught me that obstacles are rarely barriers—they are solutions in disguise. I’ve learned to look past the surface of a challenge to find the inherent value waiting to be uncovered.

Today, my mission is to turn what thousands of people have taught me into practical tools you can use right now, so you can get your footing today and see a way forward. Start with the free walk through your house, and add your voice to the Wisdom Harvest if you have hard-won wisdom to share.

The Big Question

If you could sit with your 25 year old self for just five minutes, what truths about love, purpose, and happiness would you want them to know — and why?

Email

chrisellisonalifewelllived@gmail.com

Location

London, Ontario, Canada