I'm one of the many people for whom coffee helps but often, inattention is a symptom of something else: for example, that you're not getting six to eight hours of sleep.

As a writer, you have control: You can play around with your own thoughts and when you find those insufficient, draw upon others': their wisdom, their humor, their failings.

Essayists write at a length that enables them, within a year, to explore a number of topics, whereas in a book, they'll likely only get to address one.

Entrepreneurship may be the most under-taught subject.

Some parents let kids "learn on their own skin" and many of those kids end up, as adults, languishing on their parents' sofas.

When you're going to school primarily for career purposes, it's more important to focus on which program is best for you. In addition, your success at college depends far more on what you do at the college than at which college you do it: Choosing the right program, then the right advisor, the right courses, the right term papers, the right co-curricular activities, the right fieldwork, the right internships. You can make those choices at any college.

It's absurd how aspirants to designer-label colleges become obsessed with perfection so they can get into one. I'm not convinced it's worth prostituting yourself for that.