Are you getting everything you can out of this life?
A self-less, feel-good blog about love, life, and work by career coach and existential adventurer, Cliff Flamer
I’m not claiming to have all the secrets to raising kids right but if I were to give one piece of advice to parents it would be to build a karaoke stage in your house.
I’m not talking about just going out and buying a karaoke machine; I mean creating a permanent space … Read more...
My first smile came from an unexpected source: the image of 5 Latino guys, covered in mud and rain, laughing hysterically outside my basement door.
Here’s the unfunny part. Our drainage system broke down, and we needed to install a sump pump and a whole new line of undergrou… Read more...
We dragged our 7-year-old to the Alameda Flea Market, kicking and screaming and clawing for her iPad as we pushed her out the door. Secretly, I thought about staying home too, mostly to work on an online course I’d been building for how to look for work.
Glad we didn’t… Read more...
In college, I had a radio show with my friend.
Cliff & Jay, Jus’ Chillin’!
It was a great gig: We had the 2 am to 6 am shift, all the time in the world to comb through WMFO’s massive record collection, including one of the largest jazz portfolios in the Boston… Read more...
There I am, sitting on our blue shag rug by the S-shaped chair in my powder-blue Battle Star Galactica pajamas, stoked as all hell at my Christmas present.
I love this picture.
I love it because it shows my unhindered excitement, which I carry in my body today. It’s constantl… Read more...
Every morning, blanketed in the black before sunrise, I walk into my office, and I’m faced with the same decision:
Do I start digging into my work pile and get a jump on my to-do’s,
OR
Do I stop and do something that seems both self-indulgent and impractical? In other wo… Read more...
Sometimes, gratitude isn’t so easy to come by.
If you’re having trouble finding it, here’s some advice: take a crappy vacation.
You don’t have to actually go anywhere; just plan it. Plan it in your head.
Where are you staying?
Are you inside or outside?
What ca… Read more...
I was hard at work prepping for a school fundraiser at my house.
I had just finished calibrating the stereo and microphones. I still needed to set up the auxiliary A/V system (just in case), make blackberry rosemary syrup for the cocktails, trim back the ivy on the stoop, vacuum t… Read more...
My daughter gave me a homework assignment before she fluttered off to Santa Cruz for a Girl Scout sleepover:
“I need to catch a fly for Biotech class.”
Easy enough.
Flies seem to find their way into our sunroom all the time. If one didn’t end lifeless on the window… Read more...
I finally ran out of staples.
It took 25 years.
In my first job as a temp at the Writer’s Guild of America in Los Angeles, I went into the supply closet after hours and stole a crate of staples. Not a box, a whole crate.
The staples were for my manuscripts.
Writing was my thing… Read more...