Creating A 'Personal Curriculum'

Back To School...The School Of Life

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash

The other day, I watched a YouTube video about using the “back to school” season as inspiration. Not to buy notebooks or new sneakers, but to create your own curriculum for life. A personal schedule and syllabus. The idea stuck with me.

Every fall, kids head back to classrooms, colleges buzz with orientation, and the air practically smells like an office supply store.

Even if you are not enrolled anywhere, it’s hard not to feel that pull toward structure, intention, and a fresh start.

So, today, I’m making my own curriculum. Time to get intentional…again.

What if I treated this season as an opportunity to recommit to the people and things that matter most, instead of letting the months slip past in a blur?

For me, that means revisiting the commitments I have already made to myself and to others. It means getting consistent with the practices that keep me grounded and healthy. And it means finally unpacking the last of my belongings.

(Full disclosure: The banker’s boxes from my recent move are piled just out of my webcam’s view. It’s well past time for everything to find its place. And anything that doesn’t fit or serve me will be donated, recycled, or resold.)

A personal curriculum does not have to be complicated. It can be as simple as setting aside an hour a week to read something challenging, starting a creative project, or learning a skill you have been curious about. It can also mean committing to a new routine or letting go of one that has been weighing you down.

The point is not to add pressure or strive for perfection. It is to approach your own life like a student: curious, open, and willing to grow.

This fall, instead of feeling left out of the back-to-school energy, I am enrolling myself right here, right now in the School of Life.

Keep calm and carry on!
Clint 🌈✌️

P.S. Part of my new curriculum includes creating at least one new video for Substack and one new video for YouTube…every week. As usual, the Substack video will be a little spicier and exclusively for paid subscribers and patrons.

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ON THIS DAY = SEPTEMBER 26

BIRTHDAYS

• 1774 = Johnny Appleseed = American gardener and environmentalist

• 1791 = Théodore Géricault = French painter and lithographer

• 1848 = Henry Walters = American art collector and philanthropist

• 1874 = Lewis Hine = American photographer and activist

• 1875 = Edmund Gwenn = English-American actor

• 1888 = T. S. Eliot = American writer and Nobel Prize laureate 🌈

• 1898 = George Gershwin = American pianist and composer

• 1901 = George Raft = American actor, singer, and dancer

• 1907 = Shug Fisher = American singer-songwriter, actor, and comedian

• 1914 = Jack LaLanne = American fitness expert

• 1925 = Marty Robbins = American singer-songwriter

• 1926 = Julie London = American singer and actor

• 1932 = Donna Douglas = American actor

• 1932 = Joyce Jameson = American actor

• 1937 = Jerry Weintraub = American film producer and agent

• 1938 = Jonathan Goldsmith = American actor

• 1942 = Gloria Anzaldúa = American scholar 🌈

• 1942 = Kent McCord = American actor

• 1944 = Anne Robinson = English journalist and game show host

• 1945 = Bryan Ferry = English singer-songwriter

• 1946 = Andrea Dworkin = American writer and activist 🌈

• 1946 = Mary Beth Hurt = American actor

• 1947 = Lynn Anderson = American singer and actor

• 1948 = Olivia Newton-John = English-Australian singer-songwriter and actor

• 1956 = Linda Hamilton = American actor

• 1961 = Cindy Herron = American singer-songwriter and actor

• 1968 = Jim Caviezel = American actor

• 1968 = Ben Shenkman = American actor

• 1972 = Beto O’Rourke = American politician

• 1981 = Christina Milian = American singer-songwriter, dancer, and actor

• 1981 = Serena Williams = American tennis player

• 1984 = Nev Schulman = American photographer, television host, and producer

• 1988 = James Blake = English singer-songwriter

EVENTS

• 1905 = Albert Einstein publishes the third of his Annus Mirabilis papers, introducing the special theory of relativity.

• 1914 = The United States Federal Trade Commission is established by the Federal Trade Commission Act.

• 1957 = West Side Story opens on Broadway.

• 1960 = In Chicago, the first televised debate takes place between presidential candidates Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy.

• 1962 = The Beverly Hillbillies premieres on CBS.

• 1964 = Gilligan’s Island premieres on CBS.

• 1969 = The Brady Bunch premieres on ABC.

• 1975 = The Rocky Horror Picture Show is released in theaters.

• 1982 = Knight Rider premieres on NBC.

HOLIDAYS + OBSERVANCES

• International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons

• National Dumpling Day

• National Gay Men’s HIV/AIDS Awareness Day

• National Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15-October 15)

• National Johnny Appleseed Day

• National Pancake Day

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PORTRAIT + QUOTE OF THE DAY

T. S. ELIOT AS A YOUNG MAN

“If you aren’t in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?”
T. S. Eliot