Chattering Class

Living fearlessly in and out of the dojo

When author Susan Schorn decided to learn karate as a way to deal with being an anxious person, she chronicled her journey from novice to double-black-belt in her McSweeney’s Internet Tendency column, “Bitchslap.”

Now in her book, Smile at Strangers and Other Lessons in the Art of Living Fearlessly, she explains how lessons learned in the dojo apply to life in the day-to-day world. She gives Brendan a (non-contact) primer.