Keys to having a good life

I had occasion this winter to write an answer to the question, "What is the key to having a good life?" Life is so complicated that it doesn't have a simple answer. What should be a short sentence is really a list of what I've learned in my first 54 years on earth. Excerpts from the litany on the last line can be found, like a benediction, at the end of every letter I write to my children.

Live within your means, stay out of debt, save for a rainy day.
Love your wife and children without reservations or conditions, and without judgment.
Always look for the fun and the humor in things.
Play with your children while they're young and while they grow up.
Treat your wife like a newlywed bride.
Keep God's commandments as strictly as you can.
Listen to your conscience.
Seek for eternal truth, and when you find it, hold onto it and treasure it.
Don't do anything that will cause you pain or regret down the road.
Care about somebody else more than yourself.
Get a hug from somebody every day.
Remember that you are a child of God, that He loves you and that He wants you to succeed.
And treat your children that same way.
Don't be afraid to love everyone.
Don't talk too much. Listen a lot more than you talk.
Eat candy, but don't get carried away with it.
Milk goes best with cookies.
Salt and pepper taste best when carefully applied to steak, medium rare.
Have fun, be safe, be good, buy low, sell high, work hard, play hard, pray hard, play guitar, kiss with your eyes closed, hug like it really matters, kiss like you really mean it.