These days, I’m learning how to manage projects.

This is not a well-developed skill for me. I’m good at managing a process — something repeatable that can be refined over time — and I’ve had a lot of experience dealing well with novel situations and improvising on the fly. My weakness is one-time, short-term endeavors with a beginning, middle, and end. Projects. Yeah, those.

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I’ve had the privilege of helping many people to prepare for sensitive or challenging conversations.

We talk about how to set the tone, how to make sense of the situation to potentially create a win-win, and how to stand your ground.

Then they ask, “Well, then what will she say? And what will I say next?” But we’re not writing a script. We’re getting ready for an interaction that can go virtually anywhere from its starting point.

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Béla Bartók’s Mikrokosmos is a collection of over 150 progressive piano pieces, meaning that each one introduces a new element, making it slightly more challenging than the one before it. I guess Bartók wrote the first couple of volumes for his son, who was learning to play the piano.

When I first learned of Mikrokosmos, I was intrigued. I love progressive educational material in any subject, even though the pacing usually needs to be adjusted by supplementing with additional resources. It’s satisfying to think that someone has carefully curated a learning program and created something that flows easily from concept to concept, skill to skill. Plus, I enjoyed the Bartók pieces I played myself as a child — bold, memorable, and full of surprises. This could be great!

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I remember the realization, years ago, that I wasn’t sure how I was going to make payroll two weeks later.

Sort of. Honestly, it’s happened so many times that it all sort of blends together now. But I do remember the feeling of the raging storm in the pit of my stomach, walking through the world with a tremendous and constant sense of distraction, unable to focus on work, my daily routine, or anything other than the fact that I was a huge failure.

I learned from the experience. I learned how to ask for help. I learned how to look at exactly what is happening in my business right now instead of letting the future be vague and hopeful. I learned how to run a leaner organization and not say yes to everyone I liked and wanted to hire.

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I was working with an eighth-grader to solve a challenging math problem.

“I’ve read the solution, but I don’t understand the steps,” he said. “I don’t understand what they did.”

Solving a complex problem is like learning the rules of a complex board game: It’s much easier to understand by playing, not just reading. If you’re not engaging with the problem, the words don’t mean anything.

The answer doesn’t help you much either — the punchline of a joke means little without the setup, and reading the last page of a novel has no resonance if you didn’t spend the time investing in the story.

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