Partying Prepares You for Parenthood

As I look back on things I did before becoming a parent and ask: what did I do that helped me not found in books or from others? An unlikely answer:

Partying

All the partying I did, such as: traveling to events and hosting events helped me because of:

• logistics
• operations
• solving in the moment

All of these come up traveling and hosting parties all the time. When you’re a parent, you never know what will happen no matter how well planned.

Logistics

One rule I learned:

When leaving, pack out cleanly - everything will show up at the destination.

Before learning that rule, I would not pack cleanly, or not remember packing something - unpack everything and lose time somewhere else.

With this rule, I am confident enough in packing out my stuff as well as my families’ stuff and not lose anything.

When a family member needs something on our way, I do have a problem, eventually - it all works out.

Operations

Planning a trip, just like traveling to an event, has numerous moving parts that can change at any moment.

Sticking to a plan and handling abrupt changes is part of the game as a parent, a big difference: changes can happen internally too!

This adds another level of operational complexity - all the experience from previous disasters and mitigations come into play smoothly.

MacGuyver Skills

Similar to operation disasters - all the skills you have from solving in the moment, aka MacGuyver Skills, help. The calm structured problem solving in a new environment for an unexpected problem that suddenly appear pays off is spades when you’re a parent.

Conclusion

These are just a small number of skills I cultivated while partying that are helping me be a parent that I never saw listed anywhere else in parenting resources I’ve seen.

OR - could this be like my wife frequently says for anything I don’t know:

This is Common Sense!

😅