Years ago, I moved to a new city with only the slimmest of job prospects (that was crazy decision number one).

I managed to find a part-time, temporary gig as an assistant teacher of music classes for older adults. We were teaching them how to play keyboard instruments, but the goal was really to sell them fancy home organs so complex that their array of buttons and dials resembled the cockpit of a 747 (the price was similar to that of an aircraft, too).

Read More

Due to, ya know, efforts to rein in a global pandemic, an unprecedented number of people are going to be staying home for an unprecedented amount of time.

Many of them are used to filling life with work and structured activities. What now?

Regardless of a person’s age, they are going to wander around listlessly if they’re not used to having all that free time. That’s why they’ll need to invest in a hobby.

Read More

As a young, aspiring singer/songwriter, I dreamed of creating something incredible.

Inspired by The Beatles, Chuck Berry, Smokey Robinson, and Bob Dylan — in other words, world-class, genre-defining, generational talents — I thought about where my music would fit in the pantheon of the greats.

In my “planning,” I completely skipped over the part where I would write, perform, and promote my music, connecting with potential partners and fans one by one, building a career the way everyone has to build a career: day by day.

Read More

There are a couple of key beliefs that get in our way when we’re trying to learn something.

The first is the belief that we’re not capable. The second is the belief that it’s going to be unpleasant and time-consuming.

Even when the first is tackled, the second can cause a lot of problems. Students who are trained to be dutiful won’t question whether there’s a better way to go about the task at hand. They assume that no matter what they do, they’ll be loaded down with a bunch of boring homework to slog through, year after year.

Read More

Certain ideas can trick us into thinking that they are truths of the universe, even though they were invented by some dude somewhere.

For example, some brief research on Wikipedia suggests that the idea of a soulmate goes back to Plato — and maybe the word itself can be credited to Coleridge? (Citation needed.) And yet how many people have agonized over their missing soulmate, even to the point of dissatisfaction with a perfectly good partner, because they believe that soulmates exist and they haven’t found theirs yet?

There’s nothing wrong with you if you haven’t found your soulmate. That’s because soulmates aren’t a real thing.

Read More