How my Beatles class is teaching me a lot about life
The band not the bug
From 1962-1970 they made 22 singles, 13 albums, 4 movies, and took over the world
You may think that taking a class on The Beatles for a humanities credit is an easy A, and, to be honest, I thought that too. Until I actually took it.
Yes, I do know more about John Lennon than my own mother thanks to this course, but I am getting more out of this class than I could have ever anticipated. The four gentlemen that made up The Beatles come from all different backgrounds and came together – as their hit song instructs – to create a legacy that will never burn out.
Welcome the struggles life throws your way
I’ve always thought that adversity early in life either makes or breaks you, and that is no exception for The Beatles. They pulled from their heartstrings and used their music as an escape from the hard times. The death of parents, divorce, poverty, medical issues, and school troubles were part of what made their music authentic with real feelings behind each track.
This escape turned into Beatlemania, but that led to an even more extreme issues of loneliness and depression at the peak of their success for Lennon – reference the song “HELP!” because he wasn’t kidding.
Money doesn’t equal happiness and it’s lonely at the top
The world trains us from birth to want more money, more success, faster cars, and bigger houses. These thoughts being jammed into our brains has given impressionable young people the belief that those things mean happiness. The Beatles wanted to make music and some money, but sadly got into the fast lifestyle. It’s lonely at the top and millions of women wanting to tear your clothes off at any moment sounds like heaven, but finding someone who is genuinely in love with you back is the real meaning of happiness.
Work hard, play hard is actually a great life motto
Work ethic is hard to scrape up in college when Netflix and Franzia exist, but if four young men from Liverpool can learn how to moderate the balance of working hard and playing hard, then we should be able to as well. They started from the very bottom begging for someone to let them record something and became the first successful British band in the US ever within a couple years.
This is the result of 15 hour recording sessions and playing 8-10 hours a night in Hamburg to get their name out there. I really want to graduate and get a good job just like they wanted to become famous musicians, so I have to suck it up, sit my ass down, and open up my damn textbook.
Life is impossible to plan
Through this class I have also discovered how luck actually plays a huge part in the path you take in life – or you can call it faith if you’d like. Opportunities and utterly weird circumstances can come your way at any second. There was no reason for Brian Epstein to ask to be The Beatles manager, he was a record store owner! There was no reason for George Martin to let The Beatles record one of John and Paul’s original songs even though he thought it sucked, but he did.
Chances will come by you without you even knowing, and you have to remember to never take them for granted because “yesterday came suddenly.”
Be the Ringo Starr
Ringo never got involved in the petty squabbles of the band. He was never the one to stir the pot and have a temper tantrum when he didn’t get his way. Ringo had the most successful solo career out of the whole group after the breakup. He was also the only Beatle to have all of the other bandmates on a solo album. Ringo remains the coolest Beatle and is still touring to this day.