Preface

A colleague scheduled personal growth workshops a couple of times a year. In them, people participated in activities in large and small groups, then went off in clusters and talked with one another and about themselves. Along the way, most of them discovered or rediscovered something about who they were. At the end of the workshop people jotted down their thoughts on chart paper or a bulletin board. It was a chance for them to reflect on the experience or to say what they learned for themselves. I presume my Anon. was reminded that he or she needed to break out of the usual mode if he or she wanted life to be -- what was it? -- more exciting? more peaceful? less stressful?

I'd been to several of those workshops. It was a way for me to step back and take a look at myself and how I was functioning in the world. It put me in touch with ideas like the statement I read and liked, and sometimes it told me something about who I am.

Most of the time I keep doing the same things and they keep turning out the same way. A lot of the time that's OK for me, but often it's not. It's a great comfort, and a disquieting challenge at the same time, to know that I can do something other than I always do, and get something other than I always get. The same is true for you.

Here you get a chance to look through my eyes at what you do and what you get. You'll find suggestions that will enable you to get something different than you've always gotten out of life. You'll see some different choices you can make about how you act and talk and think and feel.

I can choose. You can choose.