How not to...teach others how to do something

I've become intrigued lately with different types of articles and thinking about whether I could write them for publication. Take how-to articles, for instance. Pick up any publication and there's bound to be one, or nine, articles informing readers how to do something. How to pick out a cut of meat. How to pick lottery numbers. How to pick your nose. Even how to write a how-to article.

So I've studied some of these articles (including the how to write a how-to article), and they seem pretty easy to write. You don't really need any special degrees or training in anything, just some know-how in a particular area. Women's magazines are full of these articles. Well, I think. I'm a woman. I know how to do lots of things. (My sister says I do things on the computer she has never seen anyone else do.) Maybe I should write a how-to article.

So I think about what I know how to do, and what out of this vast store of knowledge I am willing to share with other people. Ahh, therein lies the difficulty. Would you really want to tell people how to cure hemorrhoids using your self-developed remedy? Or how to scrape a dead spider off a shoe? Me neither. Some knowledge is just better kept to oneself (though I'd suggest just throwing the shoe out). So my list of how-to subjects that I can write about for the public narrows considerably.

Then I run through a typical day in my mind, thinking of something I do in the course of a day that would be helpful for others to know about. And I am dismayed to realize that I cannot think of a single thing. So I go through each room of my house in my mind, searching for, perhaps, some housekeeping or decorating tips that I could pass along. Still nothing. All I can come up with are things like how to waste time. How to procrastinate. How to kill plants. And I sit there, stunned, and think, maybe I should run away and join a circus.

No, what I'm really thinking is, how could I have attained an age of maturity and not have any skills that are worth passing along? At least, any that people don't already know about. I feel like a side show at the circus: "SEE THE WOMAN WITHOUT ANY UNIQUE SKILLS."

I mean, who doesn't know how to make money from your home without even trying? Surely everyone -- what's that? You want to know how to do that? Well, pull up a chair....