As a Thought Leader, parents often ask me: “How can I get my son to major in stacking Benjamins instead of squandering our cash on medieval Catalan poetry?” Or: “Why is my daughter’s hair indigo? Why is she majoring in Women’s Studies—whatever that is?”

As burnout rates reach unprecedented highs, with 76% of professionals reporting chronic exhaustion and workplace attrition threatening global productivity, individuals are taking matters into their own hands. Sometimes with the help of biotech startups, sometimes with just a dash of performance training, and other times with solutions that would have been unthinkable just a decade ago.

Middle of January be damned, we were three 17-year-old girls preparing for our first Dracula’s Ball, and there was no way we were going to take any chances that could result in social suicide. Granted, Dracula’s Ball was held four times a year, but who wanted to go to a vampire-themed party all sweaty in the middle of summer? Attending in the dead of winter made perfect sense on all levels. And did goth parties have coat checks? I didn’t know. I’d never seen a goth in a puffer coat, especially not one with a big fuzzy hood. I assumed all goths mastered the art of layering, or maybe they’d just learned to defy the weather.

Sure, it feels utterly euphoric plunging your acutely sensitive skin-covered phalanges into that soft, hot, sticky mass of dough, but is that really a sustainable practice?

Advice from a Seasoned Professional My first time living in Japan—properly living, not touristing—was in a small town called Nakatsu, Oita Prefecture, where I worked as a middle school English teacher. Every city and region in Japan has one or more local claims-to-fame, and in Nakatsu’s case those specialties were fried chicken, eel, getting shit-faced

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