1) Know what it means to be yourself and to expect to be appreciated as such. If you choose to be yourself, then other people are just going to be themselves around you as well and 99.9% of them are going to be bloody useless to you and they'll expect to be appreciated as such too. Provide value, there is no such thing as a free meal.

2) Providing value is half of the job, getting rewarded is the other half. Most people won't pay you because they are nice and fair, they will pay you because they'll have to. Many people will take your meal for free without paying/rewarding you at all if they can and - don't worry for their conscience - they'll rationalize it very well. Guard your power, don't let it slip away in hazardous endeavors, unfavourable social dynamics, dubious contracts etc.

3) The power to walk away and have decent alternative prospects is priceless. Never let anyone be the master of your outcome.

4) People will tell you that life is not about money to look nice. The truth is that it's when you don't have money that money becomes your life. Money dictates a large part your life wether you want it to be true or not, but it may do so in less apparent ways when you have a decent amount in the bank. Choose how money will dictate your life instead of letting it choose for you.

5) Honesty is overrated. Better be "wrong" in a comfy room than being right with your ass sitting in the snow. Most heroes don't end up with nice stories like the tales we often hear, they usually end up in places you wouldn't want to be in.

6) Beware of people who give you advice and how they do it. Do they offer a convincing proof/explanation that their advices are well founded ? Do they have anything to lose if their advices turn out to be terrible ? Is their professional reputation on the line ? Would they bet their money on them ?

Many people are driven by feelings. Many people give (often ill-researched) advices to feel good about themselves. Now what's so bad about it ? Well, most of the time, if their advices happen to be disastrously bad, it's obviously not going to make them feel good about it, so they'd rather forget about you to avoid bad feelings than help you even a tiny bit.