When you were born, you didn't come with an owner's manual; these guidelines make life work better.

Rule 1: You will receive a body

You may like it or hate it, but it's the only thing you are sure to keep for the rest of your life.

Rule 2: You will learn lessons

You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called life on planet earth. Every person or incident is a Universal Teacher.

Rule 3: There are no mistakes, only lessons

Growth is a process of experimentation. "Failures" are as much a part of the process as "success".

Rule 4: A lesson is repeated until learned

It is presented to you in various forms until you learn it -- then you can go on to the next lesson.

Rule 5: If you don't learn easy lessons, they get harder

External problems are a precise reflection of your internal state. When you clear obstructions, your outside world changes. Pain is how the Universe gets your attention.

Rule 6: You will know you've learned a lesson when your actions change

Wisdom is practice. A little of something is better than a lot of nothing.

Rule 7: "There" is no better than "here"

When your "there" becomes a "here" you will simply obtain another "there" that looks better than "here".

Rule 8: Others are only mirrors of you

You cannot love or hate something about another unless it reflects something you love or hate in yourself.

Rule 9: Your life is up to you

Life provides the canvas; you do the painting. Take charge of your life - or someone else will.

Rule 10: You always get what you want

Your subconscious rightfully determines what energies, experiences, and people you attract - therefore, the only foolproof way to know what you want is to see what you have. There are no victims, only students.

Rule 11: There is no right or wrong, but there are consequences

Moralizing doesn't help. Judgements only hold the patterns in place. Just do your best.

Rule 12: Your answers lie inside you

Children need guidance from others; as we mature, we trust our hearts, where the Laws of Spirit are written. You know more than you have heard or read or been told. All you need to do is to look, listen and trust.

Rule 13: You will forget all of this

Rule 14: You can remember any time you wish

About "The Rules for Being Human"

During the 1990's I attended many different trainings in spiritual practices and spiritual healing. Many times the teachers would give handouts with nice helpful sayings on them. The kind of saying that makes you go "hmm.. that's very interesting, I can learn a lot from this". One of those was titled "The Rules for Being Human" and attributed to "Anonymous". The rules struck me pretty deeply and inspired the pictures on this site. The words come from that sheet of 'rules' attributed to Anonymous, the pictures are mine and were drawn some time in the mid 1990's.

One year, for Christmas, I made a pamphlet with these drawings and gave a copy to all my family members. Yeah, Christmas. I know. Some of them even liked it. One even spent all night pouring over this material and told us the next morning how deeply it affected him.

Many other people also received these rules as I did and yahoogling "The Rules for Being Human" turns up many variants of these rules on many different web sites.

The rules didn't magically appear out of thin air. They were written by a person: Dr. Cherie Carter Scott.

The real author of these rules has written a few books and is a life coach. One of those books, If Life Is a Game, These Are the Rules, is specifically about these rules. If you found these rules helpful and interesting you may also like the book.

Her other books include:

If Life is a Game these are the Rules. is a video showing the original author discussing these rules.

Who "I" am is really unimportant to this. What's important is what you, the reader, do with this. I hope you are as moved by these simple and powerful rules as I am.

If you like this site please consider making a link to it: <a href="https://rules4humans.com">The Rules for Being Human</a>

In case you want to find out more about me, visit peaceguide.com