One fine morning, on my day off, I happened to be carrying my guitar with me and it wasn’t even in its case, because there was no sign of rain in sight. I guess I’d also put quite a lot of faith in the weather forecast, but it all turned out well, because it didn’t rain and I’d go on to meet a busker who I joined in song to enhance what was an already a beautiful piece of music she was playing.

Allow me set my modesty aside for a bit, will you?

So anyway, her name was Eve, from Turkey of all places and she was a backpacking busker with whom the little cameo I had taught me some survival hacks I thought I’d share with my readers.

Try-before-you-buy value demonstration

Sometimes in life you have to give people a little glimpse of the value you have to offer, in a sort of try-before-you-buy type of demonstration. People filled the overturned Panama hat with plenty of notes and coins, all of which I let Eve take, of course, because for me it wasn’t about the money. I should mention that she plays the violin and rather beautifully too.

Anyway, would anybody have “paid” her if she emailed them or knocked on their doors to try and offer to play them a beautiful piece of music? Definitely not, but once she started playing and people actually realised how much they loved what they heard, they were more than happy to “pay.”

Sometimes the Establishment cannot be avoided

She offered me a full half of the money, but I would have none of it, so she said she’d at least have to take me out to lunch and, based on her choice of where we were to eat, I learned another survival hack. She wanted us to look for independent food sellers such as those who have food stands and food trucks, but we couldn’t find any on that particular day. So sometimes the establishment simply cannot be avoided and there are definitely some times when the exploits of the establishment make for the best choice.

Using life’s “feelers”

So there came a point when I asked Eve is she would be living like this her whole life and she replied that she really doesn’t know. Responding to my concerns around issues like insurance and being able to afford legal fees should the need arise, she made reference to the fact that if for example you’re looking for a personal injury attorney Los Angeles has some really great ones which are more than happy to offer a free consultation so as to evaluate if you have a strong case or not.

Now that was a very specific example, but I managed to get the gist of what she was communicating, which is that life has certain “feelers” available which you can use to gauge the legitimacy of a certain path you want to follow. It’s all about learning how to identify and read them.