Try something new this weekend! Yeah buddy, you!

Sanibel Island, Florida, 2009

You know what's almost gone? August! And it's taking summer with it!

A few months ago there was something new you were thinking about trying this summer. Stand up paddle boarding perhaps? Chess? That green stuff in jars that yoga people seem to enjoy drinking or eating or whatever they do with it?

Well, it's now late August. Did you do take on something new? Summer isn't over, friend, but you can see the end of it from here. You better get cracking. 

For what it's worth, I'd suggest something that's completely new and an entirely different than anything you've tried before. Sure, trying tenor saxophone when you already play alto saxophone puts you ahead on the learning curve. But do you really need two goddamn saxophones? When you could have a saxophone and a unicycle instead?

Of course, this isn't about "having." It's about "doing." And for me at least, doing something completely new puts me onto the fastest funnest part of the learning curve.

The part where every single thing you do is learning something new.

The part where you have zero ego attached to the activity.

The part where you can revel in your ineptitude and be a child again.

Last summer, when I was learning to play the ukulele, I came across this Ted Talk video. It's about how to learn anything in 20 hours. The rumored 10,000 hours it takes to be an expert at something? You probably don't have that kind of time this weekend. But 20 hours? You could get a good jump on that.