How to monetize your interests without really "working"

[jacob]

You don't have to be an expert to teach. Sometimes (often!!) the best teachers are those who have only recently learned something because they still remember what was hard to understand whereas experts will often be unable to understand how this seemingly trivial issue can possibly be hard to do or comprehend.

It's a problem I now have with ERE.

[almostthere]

@ Jacob - Many thanks for your thoughts on this thread. They finally opened my eyes to the many ways I can teach and inspired me start my very first blog post / tutorial.

[luxagraf]

To echo what Jacob said about teaching, I think a lot of people look at it backwards, thinking that some one teaches because they're an expert in the field when in fact they're usually an expert in the field because they teach.

[Devil's Advocate]

He's how Jim Henson did it.

http://blog.longreads.com/2013/09/18/on ... d-his-art/

Enjoyed reading that perspective. Thanks for the link.

How about an elementary school?

Not a bad idea at all!

In one sense that wouldn’t really be part of my “interests”, at least current interests. And my first reaction to that was to think it a bit far out! On the other hand, and on a moment’s reflection, I find that it does make a great deal of sense! I do take a very hands-on approach to teaching my own kids (well, kid, singular : the other’s still to young to be taught, in this sense at least), and I can see how these two activities (teaching “officially” and teaching at home) can help one another.

And yes, one is certainly expert enough in many things (and can easily become expert enough in things one doesn’t already know) to teach young children.

Actually I had taught once, for a period of some weeks, long long back. That was just voluntary work, unpaid, but I do remember how good it felt to be “making a difference” (if you’ll excuse the cliché).

There actually are some professions that are inherently “noble”, if done right and in the right spirit. Inherently “better” than other ways of earning money. Doctoring (as well as nursing, of course) comes to mind ; and teaching, especially teaching children, would be another.

You don't have to be an expert to teach. Sometimes (often!!) the best teachers are those who have only recently learned something because they still remember what was hard to understand whereas experts will often be unable to understand how this seemingly trivial issue can possibly be hard to do or comprehend.

It's a problem I now have with ERE.

Actually, to be a really good teacher, you do need to be an expert (expert, that is, given the level of the student). Purely my personal (if strongly held) view, and like most of my views on just about everything, subject to change given enough evidence or argument to the contrary.

Here’s where I’m coming from. Say you’re teaching physics at undergraduate level. Now if you know your undergraduate syllabus inside out, but know nothing beyond that, you are not likely to be a particularly good teacher. Couple that with the fact that most teachers (indeed most people of any description and of any profession), when faced with questions they do not know the answer to, rarely reply “Sorry, I do not know that.” And you end up with a pretty terrible teacher. Of course, even if you’re fully honest, even then if you end up saying “Don’t know” to too many of the off-syllabus questions that alert and intelligent students ask you, you’ll still not make a very good teacher.

Two personal-ish examples:

I teach an undergraduate course in a subject roughly allied to my profession. And I also train professionals, again in my profession. Part-time. Now the subject matter of both types of training/teaching is fairly elementary, but I find that I am able to do justice to them only because my knowledge and experience of this field goes far beyond the specific content of those courses. This enables me to clear fundamental doubts of my students really effectively (although I say it myself), and in a way I couldn’t have done had I simply had lecturer-level minimum knowledge. And my don’t-know moments are few enough that I can clearly say “I don’t know” when I do not know something, without feeling foolish or inadequate.

Another example : I have dabbled a good deal in “spirituality”, and have some considerable experience in Hatha Yoga and Pranayama, and in certain types of meditation. There’s lots I don’t know, naturally, but there’s lots I do know too. About the technique I mean : about the deeper significance I choose to be firmly agnostic, despite what tradition dictates. But the point is, these disciplines require really deep study of both theory and the actual practice in order to be able to instruct properly and effectively. Which is why I am outraged when I see people with minuscule knowledge set out to earn money by teaching others in these fields (I mean the whole New Age deal, which abounds in flakes and naïve gullible “marks” as well as unscrupulous conmen out to milk this whole spirituality “industry”) simply because it is so easy to look knowledgeable about esoteric subjects with just a bit of reading and minimal experience : they do not realize (or if they do realize, do not care) how, in their greed for easy money, they may end up potentially causing deep-rooted damage through their teaching, based as it is on a purely superficial knowledge.

I guess the same point could be made with most areas. To be a really good gym instructor, you need to have studied physical culture in a good amount of detail. If you’ve merely casually worked out (as most of us do), and have some idea of how gym equipment are to be used, and with that scant knowledge (and a presentable physique) go out to become a gym instructor [and many gym instructors are no more than just that], well then you run the risk of causing a good deal of harm to those unfortunate enough to have become your students. You do earn some money, true, but at what cost?

Of course, I realize the difficulty that would arise if only experts got down to teach. No matter what the field. The supply of teachers would then come nowhere close to the actual requirement, and many students would go untaught! I suppose an inexpert but informed, earnest and enthusiastic teacher is better than no teacher at all!

And yes, the question of enthusiasm. If you’re a pro in Physics, like you yourself were, you may well find teaching undergraduates a drag. That’s an issue too. But probably an independent issue : an issue of whether teaching is your (that is, that pro’s or that expert’s) “thing” at all.



But no, Jacob, I do get perfectly where you are coming from. Just thinking aloud here.

In fact, I’ve really really enjoyed the posts on this thread. And gained from it as well. You know, how you fiddle with an issue, keep on playing with it, and suddenly some solution emerges : I feel that way here. (Not that I know if a “solution” will actually end up emerging, that I can immediately put into practice, and not that it will necessarily be a very bad thing if no such solution does emerge, but you know what I mean.)

To echo what Jacob said about teaching, I think a lot of people look at it backwards, thinking that some one teaches because they're an expert in the field when in fact they're usually an expert in the field because they teach.

That’s an excellent point, luxagraf. You are right, one way of gaining expertise of a kind can be through teaching (as opposed to the real deal, which is advanced study and research, or actual work in the real world, depending on the field we’re talking of here). It's not the only way, not even the primary way, of gaining expertise in a subject, but it is certainly one way of gaining expertise of a sort. But there are two problems with someone becoming an expert through teaching :

(1) The earlier batches of students that this teacher teaches are in the unfortunate position of being guinea pigs for this teacher, and will end up getting a very raw deal.

(2) This teacher who’s “come up the ranks” (as opposed to joined fully trained and expert) is unlikely to have very great depth of knowledge. See my reply to Jacob, just above, where I try to address this in more detail and with examples. This teacher may, through repeated practice, become well-versed in the limited matter that he is actually required to teach, but he may not be able to link that small body of knowledge to the bigger whole to present a more complete picture, that only an expert can. Also, he will often be unable to answer probing questions of alert students.

(Although again, if he’s fully honest, admits his ignorance freely, and along with such alert students seeks out to find out more—assuming he has the wherewithal and the time to do that—then, with time, he will have gained a good amount of expertise. That much I do agree with. So at least those students that he teaches later on in his career may not really have much to complain about.)

I’m not really saying you’re wrong (or that Jacob is wrong). Often people who’ve done research or had industry experience and therefore are true “experts” are loath to teach : that does happen, often. Two different drives and aptitudes and interests are at play here.

I’ll generally be queasy of learning anything from someone who’s not really good. (I’ll not be very happy learning about ERE from me! Or from you! I’d far far prefer to learn it directly from Jacob, despite his protestations. *Smile*) And therefore, I’d be queasy setting out to teach something I’m not really good at.

But perhaps I'm being blinkered and overly scrupulous. When you're picking up some new things, then I can see how teaching them can accelerate one's learning process. And it can help one make some money too. As for one's students, well ...

[thebbqguy]

I'll post another vote for teaching. I know several bbq contest competitors that make their entire living teaching others how to compete in professional bbq contests. At $750 a pop and 100+ students per year that's not a bad example.

I know a couple of other guys who trade fishing equipment for extra money.

I know several who trade in bicycles, motorcycles and items with small gasoline engines like lawnmowers and weed eaters.

[Devil's Advocate]

Jacob, in one of your blog posts or perhaps comments following your blog posts (but in the blog and not these forums, if I remember right) you’d mentioned how you used to make a bit of money, back during the two/three-year period when you were “retired”, from writing stuff on the Internet. I don’t mean the blog or anything like that, nor coding work either, I think it was about doing some kind of job work online with normal (non-code) language. Can’t remember where specifically, which post, but I’m pretty sure I read this on your blog. Can you please tell us some more about it?

Everyone here “owns” an Internet connection I think. I myself don’t (not even a computer, except for a very old desktop that’s offline and which for security reasons I’ll not connect to the Net), but it shouldn’t be too difficult to get hold of another computer and a regular connection. So this could be an easy option for many people.

[mfi]

http://earlyretirementextreme.com/my-4- ... -week.html

[ashe]

I'm wondering about the idea of buying a car, shipping it to California and selling it there, from Ego's post.

Has anyone on this forum done something similar?

I'm currently based in Germany, is there an older car type in Germany that might do well in California and meet the import restrictions?

[Gilberto de Piento]

I used to make some money buying and selling motorcycles but never internationally. You can buy them with issues and fix them, buy in a small market and sell in a big market, or buy in fall and sell in spring.

This is just one opinion but buying and selling vehicles locally even if you know a lot about them is a good way to lose money or get into a big project or hassle. I think that doing this internationally is going to be a huge hassle and not profitable unless you are a pro and doing some volume.

I haven't looked at it in a long time but a paper copy of Hemming's Motor News (not really news, classified ads) will have tons of cars for sale that are trading internationally. It might give you some ideas and contacts.

[KevinW]

I'm currently based in Germany, is there an older car type in Germany that might do well in California and meet the import restrictions?

Models that have a cult following and were unavailable or rare in the USA when new. Examples that come to mind:
- diesel Mercedes E-class
- Euro-spec BMW M-cars
- BMW 2002, E30 M3
- air-cooled Porsche 911
- Alfa Romeo

You can guesstimate prices on http://sfbay.craigslist.org/ or http://www.ebay.com/motors . It's true that 25+-year old cars are exempted from Federal import rules, but there may be California-specific SMOG rules, do your due diligence there.