When life prepares you for life

The beauty in recognizing life's moments connected across time

A karate kid in Penang, Malaysia, 2025.

My first drum lesson was an assignment to watch a movie about karate. You can imagine how this confused my middle-school brain. "What does this have to do with drumming?" I thought.

Mom took me to Blockbuster. We snagged "The Karate Kid" on VHS and punched it in the VCR.

Daniel wants to learn martial arts so he can defend himself from bullies at his new school. Instead, he finds himself as the newly hired handyman for his karate teacher Mr. Miyagi. This is not what he signed up for (and not what I signed up for either).

Waxing his car, sanding the floors, painting a fence up & down and the house side to side. Only later does Daniel realize these movements would give him the edge in self defense. To "wax on, wax off" is to block bully attacks.

My second drum lesson was with a practice pad. No drum set, no cymbals, not even a snare drum. For the next two years, I played the pad, and only the pad, at every lesson.

At home, I'd let the Led out and bring the house down smashing away on my drums, annoying my sister and probably the neighbors too. But at drum practice, it was tippy-tappy on the pad only.

By learning my rudiments and sticking patterns this way, I was better able to translate them to the full kit. These lessons made me a better drummer, but I didn't know it at first. Much like Daniel, I was frustrated that I had to "wax on, wax off" instead of playing rock n' roll, backbeats and ear-splitting drum solos.

To live my childhood dream of becoming the next Travis Barker, I had to pay my practice pad dues.

20 years and hundreds of gigs later, I can see now that all my time spent improvising grooves with my friends affects the way I live my life today. There's also that one band I've followed around the US many times, a band that likes to improvise on stage just as much as I enjoy doing it as a traveler.

Do you see the link? To learn a skill in one unconnected discipline or hobby, only to apply that skill later in other areas. Our early quests prepare us what's to come, though we may not realize it at the time.

Life (then) prepares you for life (now), and life (now) prepares you for life (later).

"Yes Logan, that's obvious. What's your point?"

The last 12+ months of my life was an untethered nomadic experiment, to lean into the uncertainty with enthusiasm. And it felt so natural. I'm not lying when I say that I'm at ease in that state. To not know where I might sleep the next night, or who I might meet on the road that could become another story worth telling.

It wasn't until these last few months in Asia that I started feeling a tiny bit of unease.

"Where should I live?"
"Where's my next paycheck coming from?"
"How can I stretch my dollars and extend my runway?"

I have some answers to these questions now, but what put me back in a state of peace was a reminder that I'm good at this. To pay close attention and surrender to what life has to offer me, to trust that I'm skilled at swimming in the waters of uncertainty and coming out better than I was going in.

Fully embracing improv in a music context, as both a player and listener, has led to me doing the same with the rest of my life. To improvise well as a musician is a learned skill with many years required for proficiency.

"Wandering" can often get dismissed as irresponsible or lackadaisical. But I see it more like a tough-to-learn skill, no different than the jazz player who can play with anyone anytime. To feel at home and comfortable in a vulnerable position is no easy feat.

Testing and tinkering with life's endless options -- how is this any different than pushing the tempo or leading the band into a key change? You gotta be confident, and tough enough to survive a fall and quickly course correct when you make mistakes.

In 2024, I realized that I continued playing the role of small-town reporter long after leaving that job in 2017. It just took on new forms, like always making new friends, and finding unique and interesting people on my travels and in my hometown.

Later came the decision that some of these stories, about others and about myself, should be shared.

Reflect on your journey, from job (or city move) A to B to C. Or your personal ups and downs, the challenges that have shaped you to become who you are today. I think it's beautiful to recognize how it's all connected.

"No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man."

What comes before helps you navigate what comes next, but with more confidence and purpose. You just may not know it at the time, like the Karate Kid, and wannabe Travis Barker.

Everything I make is here — loganletsgo.com
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