It happens so often and with such pleasing predictability that I know it to be part of the learning process now.

I find out that I got something wrong, and I instantly see the correct solution.

Luckily, because I’m not a bombardier, my errors don’t cause loss of life. I can relish the moment when testing or checking reveals my mistake and I am suddenly able to see what I didn’t see before.

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My mind was blown when I figured out I could fix mistakes in my knitting.

Even if I saw a mistake several rows back, I didn’t have to rip everything out. I didn’t even have to rip out all the rows between me and my mistake. I could simply release a stitch or two, do some surgery, and then it would be like the mistake never happened.

Since I make lots of mistakes, this is something I’ve gotten pretty good at.

Of course, there are some mistakes for which repair would take several hours — or it’s just straight-up impossible. Hopefully these mistakes are also in the category of “no one would notice this but the pattern designer” or “I have to hunt to find that twisted stitch anyway.” I let them go.

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When I was running operations at my music school, I would often get a panicked calls from one of the many teachers.

“Did you change the key?” they would ask. “I can’t get my key to work. I’ve been trying for like ten minutes — I’ve tried every key I have.”

After I reassured them that I hadn’t changed the locks without telling them, they would usually make their key work within a minute. The seemingly impenetrable mechanism would now suddenly give way. The only thing that had changed was that now they knew that they had the right key. That gave them the fortitude necessary to succeed in unlocking the door.

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I’ve written in the past about “the real world” rhetoric and the fact that many teachers feel it’s their job to prepare their students for a mythical future boss who won’t let you do any work over again or negotiate a deadline. Who are these bosses that act like fifth-grade teachers? Let’s all steer clear of them.

Beyond the silly notion that the teacher’s job is to prepare students for some mythical future job where a boss cares more about deadlines than the actual work product (“Nope! It’s a day late! I don’t even want to look at it,”) is the dark truth that these teachers are doing that very thing under the guise of “teaching accountability.”

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Ever get introduced to someone via email?

One friend generously connects you to another, then fades out of the conversation.

In my case, such an introduction often precedes a request from the new friend to “pick my brain.” And the thing they want to pick my brain about is how I started my school.

If you’ve ever been curious about how you might undertake such a project, I’ll save you an email and a coffee date. Here’s what I can share based on what’s worked for me.

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