My NaNoWriMo project–one that was loosely plotted ten years ago in NYC after a writer’s conference when I was on a roll.  In fact, I loosely plotted a whole series with the same characters.  Life has intruded, and many other books have been written meanwhile,  but it’s time to jump back into the fun of this black magic, black ops, dark sex kind of suspense novel.

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November1st  begins National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), and this November, November 2011, will be my first year to participate.

That may sound strange coming from someone who has been a writer–and a published one at that–for so many years, but I’ve never been able to do it before–holding down a stressful full-time job, plus home businesses, plus two children.

Well, this year, all that is different. This year, I have an empty nest, so I have the opportunity to see exactly how much time can I devote to writing one novel–whenever I’m not at work, that is–and how far can I get into completing a brand-new suspense novel that’s been tugging at my heart. I’ve decided to approach NaNoWriMo not as merely finishing one novel.  Hey, I might get lucky and finish one and then part of another or … life may happen as life often does,  and I won’t get finished at all, but maybe I’ll get a few good chapters written, which is further than I’ve been before on any of  these new projects.

No, I’ve decided to approach National Novel Writing Month the same way I’ve approached my diet in the past year.  Rather than use the word diet, I prefer the term way of eating. I threw myself into a new diet that worked exceedingly well, lost the weight I wanted to, and got back into shape.  I can call that diet a  success, but I didn’t stop there and go back to my old habits. No, instead I looked at it as a new way of life, of not eating certain foods that are bad for me, and of eating foods that will fuel me to better health and feeling good.

For National Novel Writing Month 2011, I plan to approach it the same way as eating –a way of eating and a way of writing. 

Instead of finishing a book hastily thrown together in 30 days, what I intend to do is get back into the practice of writing multiple pages a day on one novel.  I go back to my old standby of dictation and editing while transcribing, eking out time wherever I can and not insisting on having a full day or even a full hour to do blessedly nothing but write. 

It’s the habit I’m after this time, not the book,  because the habit will bring many more books as it has in the past…before life and my non-writing career intruded on the deep, dark plans I had for my characters

After a LONG day at the office–often 12 or so hours–I go home to work out, let go of the stress, form a boundary between work and home, and…NOT think for a little while.  So the last thing I want to do is kick my brain back into gear to analyze every little thing.  I need to be on auto-pilot and just let go.

One of the ways I do that is by creating playlists.  Seems like a simple thing, but I’ve taken this to the level of no-brainer.  And that’s good!

I’m currently trying out (with nice success!) the diet/exercise regimen recommended by the brilliant folks at Metabolic Effect Fitness (check out their book and/or like their Facebook page for regular tips).  Their methods are similar to what I’ve found through experimentation to work for me.

Every day of the week, I go for  walk for 30  minutes or 60 minutes.  Generally, I use jog.fm on my iPhone, which pulls songs from my music library to match my initial gait.  It reminds me a bit of walking a labyrinth to the beat of a drum circle at the Florida Pagan Gathering  because my mind can freely wander and solve the world’s problems (or replay every little titilating conversion with that special someone) without me losing a beat or slowing down.  I don’t have the think…it’s very meditative for me.

The rest of  my regimen, I use playlists based on a little help from jog.fm.  Three days a week, I do a 20-minute rest-based workout with weights, with a 5-minute warm up and a 5-minute cooldown.  Spme of the hybrid exercises are from the Metabolic Effect book and others are from my P90X program.  So that I can concentrate on the exercises and not worry about the time, I simply follow one of several 30-minute playlists and when I hear the last song, I start my cool-down.  No clock-watching for me–that’s for the work world!

Another 2- 3 days a week, I do 20 minutes of sprints for varying lengths of time.  I use jog.fm to create 20-minute playlists at different speeds, say 5mph or 8 mph. 

The biggest difference in this exercise regimen and ones I’ve tried before is that it’s more time-based for me.  It’s short and effective, but the very specifically timed playlists keep me on track and my focus where it should be.

Just for grins, here’s one of my rest-based high-intensity weight session playlists:

1.  Katy Perry’s “Hot N Cold” (warm-up)

2. AC/DC’s “You Shook Me All Night Long”

3.  Pink’s “U + Ur Hand”

4.  Lady Gaga’s “Just Dance”

5.  Duran Duran’s “Hungry Like the Wolf”

6.  Ke$ha’s “Blow”

7. Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” (just the push I need to keep me on track and let me know I’m nearly done)

8.  Pink’s “F**king Perfect”  (cool down and congratulate myself on a fast and effective use of my time!)

This photo is a great example of #9 below.   Copyright by Lorna Tedder.

1.        The Fujitsu ScanSnap S1300 Color Mobile Scanner:   The smallest ScanSnap document scanner—multi-page, double-sided scanning, all sized of documents from receipts to legal paper, fast, up to 10 sheets at a time, up to 600 dpi.  It’s a teensy tiny scanner that takes up very little room on my desktop—so it’s always there!  This one little scanner in the past year has helped me clear out NINE filing cabinets of important papers, now in my Dropbox account,  and keeps me organized because I simply scan and forget about any important mail or documents as they come into my house.    Makes it easy to NOT be a hoarder!  Check it out or take a look at a slightly bigger version.

2.       Shakeology nutritional shake:  A low glycemic index shake with 70 nutrients, Shakeology functions as a meal replacement or a meal supplement.  It’s like a liquid-vitamin-slash-protein-shake to me with only good side effects:  more energy, lower cholesterol, better digestion, and very quick and easy.  I drink it daily as breakfast and, if I get a late evening craving,  as a “chocolate mousse dessert, ”  which is about, oh,  3000 calories less than what I used to eat for a chocolate dessert!  My favorite way to drink Shakeology is the 140-calorie (far less than a candy bar or soda) method of pulverizing a double handful of ice cubes, a little water, and a scoop of chocolate Shakeology in a blender.  The end result, depending on how much water I use, is somewhere between a chocolate slushee and a thick chocolate mousse, and I do like the taste.  It’s pricey and not sold in stores, but I’ll tell you the best deal.  You can order it (money back guarantee) here at $4-$5 a shake, but if you like it and find it helpful, sign up as a “coach” as I did and the price comes down to a very manageable $3 per shake/meal and free shipping.

3.        A second computer monitor:  Shoot, I’d have four if I could hook them all up.  This is a must-have for the multi-tasker like me.  I’m just too fond of being able to compare or work between multiple documents in multiple programs all at once.  When I bought my newest desktop, I picked up this one as well.  An ex-boyfriend used to joke that my desk—a near-circle of monitors and techno-geek tools, looked like something out of a Captain and Tennille concert. 

4.        “Getting into the Vortex” Guided Meditations and User Guide (CD and Book):  A musically-scored, breath-enhancing CD of four 15-minutes meditations for General Well-Being, Financial Well-Being, Physical Well-Being, and Relationships.  I’m a big fan of meditating but this is a bit different from other meditation CDs in that the breathing sequence is extremely calming. I’ve noticed a greater sense of serenity in myself since doing the 15-minute daily meditation (easy!) and have even noticed my college-student daughter’s increased calmness and sense of joy since she’s been meditating every morning before school. 

5.       Roku streaming player:  Stream movies, music, and TV shows to your Roku through channels like Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon Video-on-Demand, and Pandora.  I actually have two Roku players now—one for my home gym where I watch daily while on my treadmill and one for the family room where houseguests tend to gather and watch reruns of Buffy, Xena, Torchwood, and …the XFiles.

6.       The Amazon Kindle:  Okay, I’ve been a huge advocate of ebooks and e-readers since the late 1990’s when my indie publishing company first pubbed an e-version of Access and two non-fiction guides for writers, back in the day when authors were actually ridiculed and omitted from published author forums (like within Romance Writers of America’s organization) for not having a  “real book” published by a “recognized publisher” (yes, I was there, and the elitism is why I left).  We’ve come a long way in the past 10 years, as much in technology as in a change in mindset.  Though a number of my own books are already available on Kindle, this year ebooks became real to the rest of my family.  My 17-year-old saved her money and bought her own Kindle to she doesn’t have to carry huge textbooks and assignments to her college classes.  Because the Kindle is so easy for her to handle, she now reads a book a day.  My 81-year-old mom is getting one for Christmas this year—she loves reading those huge (expensive), hardcover Republican propaganda books that weigh about 7 pounds, so now she’ll be able to curl up in her favorite chair with a device that weighs and handles about the same as a small paperback and buy ebooks on her retiree income at a substantial savings.   Me?  I went with an iPad, which I love, but for different reasons other than reading…but I do have an iPad and iPhone app for Kindle.

7.       Knowledge:  Learn a new skill, technique, or language using services like Elance and Odesk.  This year, I gave my teen an upgrade in her professional Photoshop skills for her photography business by putting out a request for quote on Odesk.  We found the perfect expert in the Philippines—the exact background she was looking for—and for $35, we purchased a series of one-on-one lessons via Skype over several months’ time.  It was all around a wonderful experience in which she greatly improved her skills, got the chance to interact with and learn about another culture, and her expert got to send hours at a time practicing his (perfect) English. 

8.       P90X exercise program:  Seriously.  It works. 

9.       An experience:  Ditch the expensive collecting of “stuff” and take a trip instead.  Or go to a special event.  I decided a couple of years ago to give my daughters an “experiential Christmas,” which meant we put our Christmas present money into a Carnival Cruise out of nearby Mobile AL to Mexico.  We spent our Christmas Eve and Christmas Day climbing  Mayan pyramids and trudging through archeological digs in Santa hats.  This year, depending on the weather, I’m hoping for a special adventure that includes ziplining over a river and bird sanctuary or perhaps visiting a wolf sanctuary.

10.   Pheromones:  An over-50  female physician I admire swears by this stuff.   The Athena Pheromone 10x for men or 10:13 for women lets you add the laboratory-synthesized product directly to your favorite perfume.

It’s been a long time since I’ve met anyone I was romantically interested in who could sustain multiple Life-Death-and-the-Universe discussions but let’s just say that this particular man is like sweet tea made with real sugar on a hot South Georgia dog day:  a little old-fashioned, very sweet, and totally refreshing.  I very much appreciate men who are my intellectual match and are non-judgmental, both for who they are and for the incredible epiphanies they bring to me.

This September has been particularly crazy with the Fiscal Yearend and slashing through as many projects in a single day as I usually do in an entire month…and I’m no slacker over the course of a month, either.  It’s a mental and physical strain and I almost find myself wishing that September were over and done with so I can get some rest.  It’s also been a difficult week for me emotionally–not that I’ve told him this–because I’ve been forced to work through some old issues and he doesn’t let me get away with changing the subject or not answering.  I’ve had to search my feelings on several past issues just to answer in an intelligent way and unwittingly he’s helped me slot some old experiences and why certain relationships failed…and why I’m glad now that they failed. 

In short, Sweet Tea makes me think, and that’s something most men don’t do for me.  Two discusssions brought me to these conclusions:

1.  We spend so much of our lives planning for a distant future.  If we’re not happy where we are now, instead of fixing it, we dream about the day…maybe years from now…when life is finally better.    By wishing to be in the future, we wish our present away.  We wish our lives away.    Yet, wherever we stand, we look back at what we consider wasted time and we regret that we wasted it.  That wasted time in the past–when we could have been having fun or doing more enjoyable work or in a better relationship–is the same as the present we wish away. 

2.  I’m at a place in my life where I don’t wish for some magical, golden future when everything is oh-so-perfect and focus on that future while the present is gods-awful bad.  As I explained to Sweet Tea, it’s like that glowing ball of happiness in the future that other people run to is something that’s inside me right now and as I move forward into the future, I take it there with me.  There’s no big something in the future that will make it all better–just me in the present, at one with my joy, moving gleefully into the future with it rather than chasing it.

Wishing away your life?  Bad!  Men who make me think?  Good!

Shannon is on the verge of 20, a college senior in Psychology, and stressed to the max.  She carries a heavy course load, works 20 hours a week in a counseling clinic, and is focusing on complicated research projects in sociology and psychology while preparing her grad school admissions packages.  So how to combat the stress?

With creativity.  That’s right–doing even more in the time-restricted schedule.

To some people, that’s odd, but not to people with creativity in their bones. It’s not uncommon for a creative person to be chastised for complaining that they’re too busy, that they have no time to get things done, but in a spare moment (or not so spare), there they are–knitting, painting, writing, beading, taking pictures, sketching….

“If you don’t have time to clean your room, how can you waste time doing something artsy?” becomes the question.  From someone who doesn’t get it, obviously.

Creative people like to stay busy, but staying busy with the analytical and logical tasks of their professions can be draining.  The stress relief isn’t from vegging in front of the TV for a spare 3 hours but from engaging the creative side of the brain.  I know several physicians who work 15 hours a day in emergency rooms, and then skimp on dinner so they’ll have enough time to indulge their musical genius in the evenings.  They don’t have to be rock stars at night–just unleash  their less analytical passions.

For Shannon, that’s either her knitting/crocheting or making jewelry.  She and I learned to bead several years ago, and now she specializes in unusual belly button rings and jewelry.  She loves the creative burst of energy from designing and making her own jewelry, and she makes a nice profit if she chooses to sell it rather than keep it for herself.

I can already see this need to balance the left and right brains in her younger sister who, after a busy day of college classes and forensics, can’t wait to spend a few hours in an uber creative photo shoot, followed by laborious CS4 editing to get the right vintage  or Hollywood look.

For me,  writing has always been a great de-stressing tool.  I used to joke about it–I’ve learned with so much workplace violence to be more careful about my offbeat sense of humor–but I would come home from a grueling 12 to 15-hour day of dealing with lieutenants, slimy defense contractors, idiot Federal employees, and Gutless Wonder bosses and…beat them up or kill them off in my fiction, which at the time was my End Times thriller, Access.  I was rather powerless at work to fight back, so I unleashed it in my suspense novels and had a blast.  I’ve taken my creativity in other directions, too–sewing, beading, photography–that I’m feeling called to re-explore.

But no matter how little time I have left in a day that’s full of high-stress analysis or possibly life-or-death situations, if I don’t make time for at least a few minutes of creative bursts, I cannot maintain balance or happiness in my life.

So go ahead:  try it.  Find something artistic to do to balance the daily logic, even if you feel you’re no good at it or can’t make any money from it.  Do it for the passion of it.

From the upcoming book, 23 Ways I Screwed Up My Life  with the Law of Attraction—and How I Fixed It

I’ve really been screwing myself at work. The day job, that is.  Once I realized what I was doing, I put an immediate stop to it.  I’d let it get out of hand, and it was causing me some serious issues here and there—increased blood pressure, lack of daylight, some missed romantic opportunities, and that general feeling of being overworked, overtired, and out of balance.

In my career with the Department of Defense, it’s usually August and especially September—the end of the fiscal year—that are ludicrous with extra work.  I’ve been through many years where my supervisor refused to allow me to take a day off during September for a 1-day trip to see a medical specialist, even though I was already working 12 hours a day and weekends. Last August, I decided to just take a deep breath and press forward, assuming that all my projects with a drop-dead date of 30 September would be done by then and life would free up in October when the new fiscal year began.

It didn’t happen that way.

Looking back, I realize how overly focused I was on getting to October not because I’d finally have a sweeter workload and more time for dating and home life, but because of the oppressive feeling of “When is this ever going to let up?”  Beyond all expectations, the projects with the 30 September drop-dead dates got extended into October, and at the end of October, I was finally where I’d expected to be a month earlier.

I kept thinking about how busy I was at the office.  I kept thinking about how stressful work was becoming again because everyone’s schedules were slipping and coinciding so that a carefully juggled schedule that included one big project per week turning into everything coming due at once.  After about 2 weeks of a lighter workload in November—I was at a spiritual retreat for half of that—I suddenly was back in the throes of work and crazy schedules.

I told myself it was only for a little while, an exception, that I wasn’t going back to the days of working late and weekends and not having a home life.  I really worried about it, and you know what they say:  if what you’re thinking about is what you’re planning, then your worrying about something is the same as planning it.   I felt my life starting to spin out of balance as I gave up much of November and December to take care of work matters that only seemed to grow as I put more work into them.  I had started doing the unthinkable….taking work home with me every night and ignoring my creative work, family life, exercise, eating right, and—(!)—romance.  It’s unthinkable for me because I’ve done that too often in the past and for my own mental health, I can’t put work ahead of everything else in my life because my health immediately suffers.   When I found out near Christmas that this new crazy influx of work would be my new norm, I panicked.

Panic didn’t make January go any more smoothly.  The first few weeks were the busiest I’ve seen in over 20 years, but then I got my schedule juggled to the point where I could spend quality time on each project.  Still, I kept focusing on how busy work was and how crazy my schedules…and within a week, everything lined up again.  By “lined up,” I don’t mean that my world became lusciously aligned with positively.  I mean that my spread-out schedule of projects suddenly rammed into each other and they were all due at the same time again.

Time travel and cloning, I said, should not be a requirement for me to get my job done.

I was so worried about letting something in my workload slip or not being able to get something to the guys in Iraq or Afghanistan on time because I couldn’t be three places at once.  My boss seemed perfectly happy with my performance—more than I would have thought—but I was the one who wasn’t happy with how much I was doing—from the point of view of doing too much and not doing enough.

I walked into work today complaining about how my 2 immoveable objects that are my regular workload just got switched around to coincide with the 3 unstoppable forces that have been assigned to me throughout the rest of this year.  When is it going to let up? I kept thinking.

…Just before I got a notice that I’m overdue on 4 mandatory training classes that should have been done yesterday.

Can you feel the downward spiral into more and more work?  Hurtling toward rock bottom?  Because the last thing to hit me was a notification of a periodic security investigation that I need to make a top priority and get my paperwork together for—this month.  What am I supposed to do with this?  This is crazy.  Crazy!  Cr….

Whoa.  If I’ve learned anything from studying the Law of Attraction, it’s that being upset, angry, overworked, etc, and getting “more of the same” is a big clue to stop and see where I am. I’ve been focused more than anything else on how busy I am and this insane schedule with my day job.  I’ve been putting off romantic liaisons, fun trips,  and home projects because I’ve been worried that I’d have to drop something for work.  This has been precisely the wrong thing to do.

So I’m backing up and not worrying about schedules.  They seem to have a life of their own, with no help from me.  I’ll handle whatever’s on my desk and get to it in the order someone sends it.  If other people can control their schedules, I’ll keep a window open for their projects and fill it with something else if they miss it…and then let them get in the back of the line for the next open slot.

I’m re-focusing on getting through each day productively and pleasantly, with interesting and pleasant discussions with customers and co-workers, and going home on time to spend an hour or more exercising,  eating a healthy dinner, sharing pleasantries with my teen, socializing with someone delightful, and indulging myself in some creative  and fulfilling work.  I’m re-focusing on upcoming weekend trips, romantic get-togethers, social and spiritual gatherings, and planting flowers in my garden.  Walking in the moonlight, walking in the sunshine, painting my toenails.

That’s better.  I felt the shift from panicked and busy to being able to breathe again serenely.

Did you?

Time management techniques improve both your productivity and—if you’re willing to change your point of view—your quality of life. It’s not really about finding time to do all the things you must do, but finding time to be all the things you want to be.

I still recall standing in the public library one evening after work when I was a busy, chaos-wrestling 25-year-old career woman (“career woman” was the term we used back then). I set my briefcase aside as I handed the librarian my choices—at least 3 sets of time management courses on cassette tape and probably 40 hours’ worth of listening. Time management had become an obsession for me because I had so much to do and so much I wanted to do—I was working 80 hours a week and I barely made a dent in either my weekend chore list or my job assignments—and I was constantly taking on more. You’re heard of The 4-Hour Work Week?

Not for me! I felt lucky to get four hours’ of sleep a night.

I listened to the tapes while I commuted, while I gardened, and while I cleaned house, but I was disappointed. I was looking for the secret treasure trove of tips. Most of it, I’d heard before. Some of the productivity techniques were good, but most were either about delegating your work to someone lower on the corporate ladder when I was the lowest or how to cram every possible minute with yet another little task to juggle with the rest. Life became an elaborate checklist.

After a time, I became quite good at what I thought was time management. Or so I thought. I really wasn’t managing my checklists—they were managing me. But I sure looked great to everyone else! In fact, you might say that I became the Poster Girl for Productivity.

Friends and colleagues marveled at how much I managed to accomplish in the same 24-hour day that they managed to go to work, feed themselves, and watch a little TV. As I finished my advanced degree, got promoted to even more responsible jobs, and started both a family and home business—all at one time—I joked that someone should clone me. That, in hindsight, was a warning signal because if I needed to be cloned a few times, then I was doing too much task juggling and not enough living.

I was so very good at managing my workload and yet my non-stop complaint was, “I don’t have time” or “There’s never enough time to do ______.” How could I accomplish so much and not have time to enjoy the moments? Life became a blur of checklists.

The key to changing my way of thinking about time management and productivity was to understand that many resources are renewable. I can always make more money, for example. What I can’t make more of is time. It’s the one resource that, whether wasted or spent, is gone and will never be renewed. I found that I could hire out tasks I had no passion for, and often at a much less rate than the value I put on my time. I found that I could hire out jobs I would have spent weeks learning the basics of, just to become productive. I found that I could hire out parts of big projects to specialists and clerical help, which meant I had the fun parts of coming up with the money-making ideas and then integrating them into one package. I found that I really could delegate most of the things I hated doing and focus my time—my most precious resource—on what I really wanted to do…and more importantly, on being what I really wanted to be.

A favorite example:  When I chose paint for my home office, I took an iPhone photo of the paint can label, which included the color, mix, store name, etc.  Then I uploaded it instantly to Evernote, which will OCR scan the label. If I need more paint or want to match another room to my home office, all I have to do is search for the store name or color maybe the word “Office” and this photo pops up with all pertinent information.

My favorite productivity tools keep me organized, on schedule, and–honestly–much more serene and less stressed than ever before.

Here are a few that work for me:

Evernote — I lov ethis tool. I added the add-on to Firefox and to my iPhone.

I use it most often (thus far) to send iphone screen shots, web clippings, and …photos/scans of things of documents I need to be able to find easily. Like these stupid training certificates at work. I couldn’t print the things so I took a pic of my work computer’s screen showing the approval because it won’t email or download, just (theoretically) print.

Evernote searches for terms including text in a document. I don’t accept biz cards anymore–just take a pic of the card and sent it to evernote. I used to use Google Notebook but since it’s no longer being expanded, I’m moving my Notebook to Evernote.

Jott– I use this favorite of my productivity tools mostly to send email or text via voice messages using my Jott iPhone app. I usually send to RTM (below), Twitter, Facebook, etc.

Remember the Milk (RTM)– my to-do-list of choice. Get the iPhone app, too.

Dropbox– a great portable filing cabinet and backup system. I can drop important files into the “dropbox” and access it from a computer at work, my laptop at the beach, my iPhone in the dentist’s office, or even at my mom’s house in the middle or nowhere.

Newest of my favorite productivity tools:

Google Calendar Application for iPhone– Getting my GCal to sync up via my iPhone has been my big productivity tool goal for the first three months of 2009, and it’s here at last! This one’s ever improving, but looks good and does everything I need.

Meeting Miser– This is a must-have if you can’t keep your team on schedule for a meeting or people don’t know when to shut up or stay on topic. Just add the salient information to the application right there on your computer screen for everyone to see (positions, hourly wage, etc) and set the timer. That 30 minute meeting that ends up running 3 hours while one of the managers tells wars stories about the old days and another who gushes about his grandchildren? The clock on the screen shows just how much that 30-minute meeting costs and how much it costs for every minute past! A real eye-opener.

More productivity tools and time management tools to come…

Time is of the essence, they say, but maybe really, that’s just the essence of time.

At least 5 times in 24 hours, I’ve been reminded that “time is of the essence” and not to tarry.  In the back of my mind, I’ve also realized that nearly half of May has already come and gone and over 4 months of this very fast-paced year.  Not that it’s flown by without purpose–I’ve accomplished a ton during that time, but the reminder is there, not so gently, to take advantage of  time to sow seeds now.  The reminders turned scary at one point and just incredibly tiring at others.

I knew I’d have to ditch my work plans last night when Aislinn suddenly spiked a fever.  I let her sleep late this morning, rather than haul her immediately into the doc’s, and that seemed to do her a world of good.  That’s when a sudden problem arose with our printer that threatened our scheduled release of Kristin Madden’s Mabon: Pagan Thanksgiving.  Time was of the essence, and while Aislinn slept, I worked frantically to smooth the rip in our schedule…which I put to bed near midnight, finally.

Meanwhile, my messages to Maverick in Afghanistan didn’t quite make it. He was able to email me, but my messages weren’t getting through. Silly boy wouldn’t come right out and tell me this, of course, because as he tells me, I’m never wrong and if I say I sent a message, then he’s sure I did.  But time was of the essence in our communications and we barely missed each other….

Thank you for reading!  The complete version of this article is now included in Give Your Life Direction.