Years ago, I was teaching music lessons six days a week and managing my music school on top of that.

I like to be busy, but I was starting to get tired. To my surprise, the thing I was getting tired of was not the bookkeeping and appointment setting and other mundane tasks. It was teaching the music lessons.

I found myself with less patience and more resignation. The energy I usually put into problem-solving, digging deep and going beyond the minimum to find just the right approach for a given student — it just wasn’t there.

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When you first start playing guitar, the physical pain can be quite a deterrent.

“It’s like getting a sunburn on your fingertips,” I tell students. “It’s okay. Keep playing every day — just take a lot of breaks.”

It gets worse before it gets better. However, for those who persist through the discomfort, magic awaits. Your body will, in obedience to your habits, provide assistance in the form of calluses. With this hardened extra skin, your guitar chords will ring out true and clear. Playing won’t hurt anymore, and your learning will accelerate.

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My favorite aspect of coaching my fellow business owners is seeing how they light up when they’re taking about their work.

Sometimes it takes them a little bit to get going, but once they’re warmed up, they speak brilliantly and extemporaneously about the challenges their clients face, common misconceptions in their field, and the way they want to make things better in the world. It’s like listening to a private TED Talk. I always wish I could share the magic with others — and reflect it back to its source.

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This isn't school. You're a grownup now. Give yourself an A if you really want one.

You get out of it what you put into it — and you get to decide what that is going to look like.

There is no "I didn't finish last time," or "I can't keep up with everyone else." It's not a race. It's not a contest. There is no scorekeeper, and there's no score.

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Okay, technically it hasn’t been daily blogging. I do give myself (and you) the weekends off.

But on February 28, 2019, I wrote my first article and clicked “publish.” And I’ve done it every weekday since then. And I have learned a lot over the past year.

There are two things that stand out the most. Unsurprisingly, they mirror the themes I like to talk about in my articles.

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