After escaping the snowstorm and the threat of being trapped in the mountains, we headed west. The snow followed us for some time. Eventually we passed an unseen barrier and the familiar hue of the desert greeted us once more.
My wife and I looked at each other alongside the edge of an anomaly it seems in this part of the world, a river. Flowing slowly, we could not help but notice the contrast of this dark and rather blueish water against the barren and orange tinged desert. We had chosen this town, Green River, Utah, as a respite before the second half of our trip and the spot where we would make our turn back towards the desert and ultimately to the conclusion of our honeymoon.
Standing next to this unassuming river, I couldn’t help but imagine what the early explorers of this region felt. Could they sense the depth and magnitude of what this river ultimately turns into many miles away from this bucolic and ebbing trickle of water? Could they know about the challenges and rewards this small river would lead to? Like the chapters that lay before us, my wife and I can sense the potential of the life that waits for us. A life together that we both turned towards, decided to create together.
It is hard to imagine that the Grand Canyon is what lies at the end of this small pathway of water. John Wesley Powell, one of the chief explorers of the Grand Canyon, passed this spot in his first expedition in 1869. I could see the silhouette of a one-armed man drifting past as I thought about the journey he underwent.
I could not help but think about the challenge of Powell’s first expedition and its comparison to the challenge and adventure of marriage. Powell’s first expedition was challenging and dangerous. The team experienced numerous cases of near drownings in places like Disaster Falls and Desolation Canyon not far from where we stood. Despite the challenges, they continued because of their goal; to explore the blank spaces on the map. Even after all they had already endured, near the end of their journey some of the team opted to go no further. These team members eventually parted ways at Separation Canyon never to be seen again. Despite these losses and the challenges, Powell’s expedition continued after Separation Canyon and ultimately made history a few days later.
The road ahead looks challenging but it is an adventure we chose together and without fully committing we may not reach our goal. We must continue forward together despite the risks and we turn back at our own peril.
I looked around as I thought all this and I realized I had been standing in reverie for sometime. My wife had already returned to the car and the fisherman to my left looked uneasy. I waved and returned to the safety of the air conditioning.
New to the site? Start here at my Latest Post or learn more about my site at the About section. Thanks for stopping by!
My hands ached from gripping the steering wheel so hard. Though we were driving 20 mph, I couldn’t spare a second to wring them out. Nor could I turn my head to see how my wife was faring. I feared she might be speaking to me though her voice was muffled by the general hum that emanated from our small rental car. With a pause in the bumping, I quickly turned and caught her wild eyes. Stunningly blue but larger than I have ever seen them before; I could tell she was enjoying this experience.
We had been traveling for half an hour or so on what seemed like a dry river bed called Hole-in-the-rock-road near Escalante, Utah. Covered in sand, dirt, and irregular sized boulders (at regular intervals) we were slowly inching ourselves along this empty road towards our goal for the day called Peek-a-boo slot canyon and Spooky gulch.
“Half way there!” I exclaimed without turning my gaze from the road.
“Oh god” is what I heard in response. She must have noticed the distance remaining on the GPS; 35 minutes to travel the remaining 15 miles.
Though our journey today was slow, we were still making great time compared to the Mormon expedition who set this path and explored this area in 1879. When the expedition set out from nearby Escalante, they expected a six week project. It took them six months instead.
The Mormon expedition of 1879 set out in November to explore and develop a “short-cut” through the rock of the canyon giving this road it’s namesake. It would take them several months to widen the crack in the canyon to develop a precariously steep route to their San Juan Settlement along the Colorado River.
The dirt and dust caked our windshield as we slowed to a stop. Cautiously we stepped out of the car, our legs shaking, it was time to hike.
Though we weren’t lowering wagons down the precipitous slope of Hole-in-the-rock, the next 8 miles would be challenging but we were well prepared. At this point in our relationship, my wife and I had been hiking and exploring together for 4 years. A conscious team we have learned each other’s strengths, weaknesses, loves, and boiling points (generally an empty stomach).
As we scrambled and rappelled at times through canyons of orange, I couldn’t help but smile at the journey ahead and its allusion to our hiking identities.
I am often asked from family members, “Why do you guys hike? Why do you do such dangerous stuff? Aren’t you tired? Why don’t you go lie on the beach?”
We usually grin to each other in response to these questions.
Yes, hiking and exploring takes effort but exercising and pushing our abilities is when we feel most alive. Surrounded by nature and to see things only reserved for those who push past comfort reminds us to never take the easy route in life, for an easy life could never reveal the beauty behind struggle.
Though we are by no means required to exercise effort to survive, a fact that we are very grateful for, seeking out and doing hard things together is some of the few times we share a level of resilience with our ancestors. Modern life can be structured in a way to keep the road smooth and never want for anything. I fear this surface level type of living.
As we climbed out of the canyon, the desert heat was sinking in now, I walked with lighter steps. Though my mind was thinking of the next meal, I was clear. I was not thinking of tasks, work, or money.
Experience has taught me that my wife was feeling the same and thus I was shocked when I turned to her as we threw our gear into the trunk. Her eyes had widened again, her shoulders slumped.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“We have to drive that road again” She sighed.
Sometimes after reaching the peak, the view, the goal; philosophical musings do not outweigh the discomfort of the return journey.
New to the site? Start here at my Latest Post or learn more about my site at the About section. Thanks for stopping by!
Title: Four Thousand Weeks – Time Management for Mortals
Author: Burkeman, Oliver
Genre: Practical Nonfiction
Category: Time Management, Memento Mori, Values
Summary:
Why does the achievement that follows busyness and hustle fade so quickly? Why is it so unfulfilling? Inevitably, the to do list fills up again, there is a new project, or a new goal. Do we strap on our boot straps and hit the gas pedal again – hustle till it’s done? Burkeman presents a new lens to the argument and helps paint a picture of why hustle culture is both an alarming lifestyle choice and doomed to failure. In this excellent book, Burkeman gives language to describe why our approach to time management is inherently flawed and based in delusion. He leaves you not with a refreshing solution but rather a perspective shifting philosophy of time management that is based in reality.
Important Points:
Finitude
Burkeman reminds us that the popularity of hustle culture is simply a rebranding of an age old problem of busyness.
…busyness has been rebranded as “hustle” – relentless work not as a burden to be endured but as an exhilarating lifestyle choice, worth boasting about on social media. In reality, though, it’s the same old problem, pushed to an extreme: the pressure to fit ever-increasing quantities of activity into a stubbornly non increasing quantity of time.
To counter and deny our finitude, we cling to the idea that we can master our time. We delude ourselves into thinking that with just “the perfect system” or once I finally clear this to do list or any other such distraction – that we can master time and accomplish everything we want and further we’ll arrive at that place where we have accomplished everything and we can finally rest and live peaceful happy lives.
The fundamental problem is that this attitude toward time sets up a rigged game in which it’s impossible ever to feel as though you’re doing well enough. Instead of simply living our lives as they unfold in time-instead of just being time, you might say – it becomes difficulty not to value each moment primarily according to its usefulness for some future good, or for some future state of relaxation you hope to reach once your tasks are finally “out of the way”…
This actually has been taught to us by culture – to prioritize future benefits over current enjoyments. Our urging to master time and use our present moment for some future benefit puts our attention elsewhere denying us the gifts of the present moment and living immediately.
The Procrastinator and the Optimizer
The procrastinator and the optimizer both sacrifice the present moment for a future state albeit in two different ways. The procrastinator resists completing mistakes or moves onto another project – adding to the to do list to resist the finitude of his life. The optimizer, in the same vein, tinkers with systems and hacks to get more done faster – to speed through the work to get to the other side of the idealized future. Both the procrastinator and optimizer work hard to avoid fully expressing the reality in which they find themselves.
…we recoil from the notion that this is it – that this life, with all its flaws and inescapable vulnerabilities, its extreme brevity, and our limited influence over how it unfolds, is the only one we’ll get a shot at. Instead, we mentally fight against the way things are…Our troubled relationship with time arises largely from the same effort to avoid the painful constraints of reality. And most of our strategies for becoming more productive make things worse, because they’re really just ways of furthering avoidance.
…Denying reality never works though. It may provide some immediate relief, because it allows you to go on thinking that at some point in the future you might, at last, feel totally in control. But it can’t ever bring the sense that you’re doing enough – that you are enough – because it defines ‘enough’ as a kind of limitless control that no human can attain. Instead, the endless struggle leads to more anxiety and a less fulfilling life.
Embrace
We must confront the paradox of limitation and embrace the finitude of our lives.
…the more you try to manage your time with the goal of achieving a feeling of total control, and freedom from the inevitable constraints of being human, the more stressful, empty, and frustrating life gets. But the more you confront the facts of finitude instead – and work with them, rather than against them – the more productive, meaningful, and joyful life becomes.
In practical terms, a limit-embracing attitude to time means organizing your days with the understanding that you definitely won’t have time for everything you want to do, or that other people want you to do – and so, at the very least, you can stop beating yourself up for failing. Since hard choices are unavoidable, what matters is learning to make them consciously, deciding what to focus on and what to neglect, rather than letting them get made by default…
Every decision to use a portion of time on anything represents the sacrifice of all the other ways in which you could have spent that time, but didn’t – and to willingly make that sacrifice is to take a stand, without reservation, on what matters most to you.
We can confront the limitation of our time in an alternative and more liberating way: Identifying our priorities and changing our relationship with time. Burkeman suggests that rather than forcing time to fit into allocated blocks, to find the ultimate system and hustle to accomplish everything you want – you can relinquish your hold and approach life with the mentality of letting time use you.
…Approaching life not as an opportunity to implement your predetermined plans for success but as a matter of responding to the needs of your place and moment in history.
It is fruitless to resist the finitude of time, to delude yourself into thinking you can accomplish it all.
…so long as you continue to respond to impossible demands on your time by trying to persuade yourself that you might one day find some way to do the impossible, you’re implicitly collaborating with those demands. Whereas once you deeply grasp that they are impossible, you’ll be newly empowered to resist them, and to focus instead on building the most meaningful life you can, in whatever situation you’re in.
Embracing the limits of our lives means making hard choices and choosing which ‘balls to let drop, which people to disappoint, which cherished ambitions to abandon, which roles to fail at’. Contrast this with the contemporary advice where we tell ourselves that if we could just do more or get more done
We try to “…address our busyness by making ourselves busier still
Solving the problem with more busyness only begets more busyness – perpetuating the cycle of speed, overwhelm, and burnout. What remains when you begin to embrace the reality of limits and to let go of the idea that you will achieve a state in the future where you will feel peace of mind and accomplish all of your demands is peace of mind in the present
…Once you stop investing in the idea that you might one day achieve peace of mind that way, it becomes easier to find peace of mind in the present, in the midst of overwhelming demand, because you’re no longer making your peace and dependent on dealing with all the demands
…The only route to psychological freedom is to let go of the limit-denying fantasy of getting it all done and instead to focus on doing a few things that count.
Prioritization
Recognizing the finitude of time means choosing a few things to prioritize. Burkeman highlights a few principles to help us prioritize and actually make sure we take action on those items rather than procrastinating our time away – another self-delusion tactic where we essentially evade the responsibility of our finite time and debate ourselves into thinking that we’ll always have more time later.
1. Pay yourself first
…the only way to be sure it will happen is to do some of it today, no matter how little, and no matter how many genuinely big rocks may be begging for your attention
- Work on your most important project for the first hour of each day
- Protect your time by scheduling “meetings” with yourself, making time in your calendars so that your commitments can’t intrude
2. Limit your work in progress
- Work on no more than 3 items
…The most appealing way to resist the truth about your finite time is to initiate a large number of projects at once; that way you get to feel as though you’re keeping plenty of irons in the fire and making progress on all fronts – because each time a project starts to feel different or frightening, or boring, you can bounce off to a different one instead. You get to preserve your sense of being in control of things, but at the cost of never founding anything important.
3. Resist the allure of middling priorities
“ You need to learn how to start saying no to things you do want to do, with the recognition that you only have one life”
Middling priorities are those priorities that are things you want to do but distract you from the other more important priorities, enough so to sabotage your progress on those priorities.
…they’re the ambitions insufficiently important to him to form the core of his life yet seductive enough to distract him from the ones that matter most.
Burkeman highlights the difference between the good and bad procrastinator. He describes the bad procrastinator as one who ignores the finitude of life and deludes himself by taking on too many projects or is consistently switching between these projects to avoid the truth of his limitations. The good procrastinator recognizes their limitations and decides as wisely as possible “what tasks to focus on and what to neglect”.
Personal Note
So much wisdom packed into this book. Ultimately this commonplace book practice is to reinforce what I read for myself but also share my thoughts with friends and family. To be transparent, I started transcribing these notes from my loose leaf notebook in January. Since then I have bounced around to my other “middling priorities” putting out fires and jumping on and off projects. I’ve returned to it only after I stopped stretching in multiple directions. A perennial issue for me but I do not bemoan my constant shifting. Lessons from this book remind me to not waste time lamenting and instead, when I return to this reality of my finitude, return to cruising speed and start taking action. Do yourself a favor and read this book.
Quotations:
…The only route to psychological freedom is to let go of the limit-denying fantasy of getting it all done and instead to focus on doing a few things that count.
…the only way to be sure it will happen is to do some of it today, no matter how little, and no matter how many genuinely big rocks may be begging for your attention
…the more you try to manage your time with the goal of achieving a feeling of total control, and freedom from the inevitable constraints of being human, the more stressful, empty, and frustrating life gets. But the more you confront the facts of finitude instead – and work with them, rather than against them – the more productive, meaningful, and joyful life becomes.
Similar Books/Further Reading:
The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking by Oliver Burkeman
Help!: How to Be Slightly Happier, Slightly More Successful and Get a Bit More Done by Oliver Burkeman
Image Source: Google Images
New to the site? Start here at my Latest Post or learn more about my site at the About section. Thanks for stopping by!
Title: Wintering – The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times
Author: May, Katherine
Genre: Nonfiction
Category: Rest, Recovery, Mental Health, Depression, Nature
Summary:
It is a lie to ignore Winter and not to recognize it as a natural season in Nature and in our lives. Modern day disorders like depression or anxiety, even the sequelae of burnout following hustle culture, likely are related to an unnatural resistance to this season. In Wintering, Katherine May presents the argument for the importance of Winter as she lives through a Winter of her own. May paints a beautiful picture of how, even in the low points of the year or even in life, rest and retreat, although uncomfortable to allow, are nourishing and formative. May’s story confronts the denial and dissonance that culture has created around Winter and encourages us to accept these seasons and learn what lessons we can from them.
Important Points:
What is Winter?
Winter is a natural season in Nature and in our lives. When things don’t go as planned – you lose your job, a relationship ends, etc; Winter is the season you find yourself in. In nature, Winter is that natural period that follows growth. The trees shed their leaves, animals hunker down, and the weak die. Without it, there could be no Spring. The same is true in our own lives. Modern culture has sold us on the message that we should strive to always be happy and we should always be working. That we can be and do all of these things. May says that we have been educated to ignore the cyclical nature of life; “…Instead we are in the habit of imagining our lives to be linear, a long march from birth to death in which we mass our powers, only to surrender them again, all the while slowly losing our youthful beauty. This is brutal untruth.” She reminds us that “Life meanders like a path through the woods. We have seasons when we flourish and seasons when the leaves fall from us, revealing our bare bones. Given time, they grow again.”
We risk living outside of the natural seasons and chapters of life. Ignoring these cycles, blunts our experience of the world. Feeding into the cultural myth that we can accomplish everything, that we can work forever, is at the expense of robbing the true essence of life – one colored by both ups and downs. Living in this manner is akin to denying death. At worst, it will delude you into thinking you have lived well when you arrive at the inevitable conclusion we all will meet.
What to do in Winter
You can arrive at Winter by recognizing the season and then living accordingly or Winter can surprise you and come on suddenly. When you are surprised by Winter, you ignore it at your own expense. To recognize Winter is to pause the unconscious cycle, to step back from living the story, to retreat. May reminds us to give Winter the respect it deserves and from her own experience we can deduce some simple principles to apply during Winter:
– Recognize when retreat is warranted and then approach that retreat by simplifying – cutting out the nonessential and focusing in on values that nourish you like Family, Community, and Service
– Return to Ritual and recognize it’s value
– No new projects or habits
– Choose activities and projects that have no tangible “outcome”
– Return to the land and spend time in Nature
– Go on long walks and swim in cold water
Quotations:
“We must get back into relation: vivid and nourishing relation to the cosmos and the universe…We must once more practice the ritual of dawn and noon and sunset, the ritual of kindling fire and pouring water, the ritual of the first breath and the last”
“…If only life were so stable, happy, and predictable to produce ants instead of grasshoppers, year in, year out. The truth is that we all have ant years and grasshopper years-years in which we are able to prepare and save and years where we need a little extra help. Our true flaw lies not in failing to store up enough resources to cope with the grasshopper years, but in believing that each grasshopper year is an anomaly, visited only on us, due to our unique human failings”
“Winter is a time for libraries, the muffled quiet of Book stacks and the scent of old pages and dust. In winter, I can spend hours in silent pursuit of a half-understood concept or a detail of history. There is nowhere else to be, after all.”
“I would not, of course, seek to deny that we gradually grow older, but while doing so, we pass through phases of good health and ill, of optimism and deep doubt, of freedom and constraint. There are times when everything seems easy, and times when it all seems impossibly hard. To make that manageable, we just have to remember that our present will one day become a past, and our future will be our present. We know that because it’s happened before”
Similar Books/Further Reading:
The World Ending Fire By Wendell Berry
The Shallows by Nicholas Carr
A Swim in a Pond in the Rain by George Saunders
New to the site? Start here at my Latest Post or learn more about my site at the About section. Thanks for stopping by!
Title: The Practice of Groundedness
Author: Stulberg, Brad
Genre: Practical Nonfiction
Category: Fundamentals, Habits, Work Philosophy, Values, Organization
Summary:
In the past, I have let myself get overwhelmed and paralyzed, in a sense, regarding habits and projects. Analysis Paralysis or the Paradox of Choice. I never had the vocabulary to describe and articulate these frenetic feelings I have had around work until I read The Practice of Groundedness. I always felt an urgency and a need to construct the perfect plan and then execute that plan. Inevitably these routines concluded with both an exasperation due to never being perfect and ultimately a track record of shallow results. Through the lens of values and a sustainable approach to growth, Stulberg presents a way to view the philosophy and failures of the “chronically behind” and rushed approach to growth. Stulberg’s perspective and the language which he uses to illustrate that perspective are refreshing and timely. A welcome lesson and mindshift in these times of hyper connectivity and ever present burnout.
Important Points:
Heroic Individualism
Why do we feel so burnt out? Stulberg begins his book by describing the culture that exists today; a culture that springs from hyper connectivity, hustle culture, and a reinforced lifestyle of “always being on”. Some of these qualities are decidedly western but Stulberg argues that they are magnified by the technology that is ever present in our lives. Today’s culture has lead to a population of people that are exhausted, worried, and pursued by a background level of anxiety reminding them that they could be doing more at every spare moment. Stulberg defines this state and climate as Heroic Individualism; “…an ongoing game of one-upmanship, against both yourself and others, paired with limiting belief that measurable achievement is the only arbiter of success. Stulberg goes on to say that culture perpetuates this state by relentlessly saying “…you need to be better, feel better, think more positively, have more, and ‘optimize’ your life – only to offer shallow and superficial solutions that, at best, leave you wanting.”
Principles of Groundedness
Stulberg’s antidote to the pitfalls of Heroic Individualism is Groundedness. He describes Groundedness as “…an unwavering internal strength and self confidence that sustains you through ups and downs. It is a deep reservoir of integrity and fortitude, of wholeness, out of which lasting performance, well-being, and fulfillment emerge.” Contrasting with modern culture, Groundedness is an approach to life that springs from your innermost values and focuses on creating a meaningful life in the present moment. Rather than living with insatiable striving and ambition, Groundedness instead turns the focus to actions that are conducive to sustainable growth and fulfillment in the here and now. It combats the unfocused and frenetic lifestyle that characterizes modern culture and replaces it with a simpler way forward. Rather than a life of infinite opportunities that paralyzes you with ever better choices leaving you with a history of half baked results, etc – a life centered around Groundedness allows you to focus on what’s actually important; “Groundedness does not eliminate ambition, it situates and stabilizes these qualities, so that your striving and ambition become less frenetic and more focused, sustainable and fulfilling; less about achieving something out in front of you and more about living in alignment with your innermost values, pursuing your interests, and expressing your authentic self in the here and now, and in a manner you can be proud of.”
Where the Heroic Individualism path is characterized by a life of divided attention, urgency, and ultimately an ever growing to do list without any change to the time we are allocated; a Grounded life revolves around a bedrock of principles that continue to sustain the Grounded life; “…happiness, fulfillment, well-being, and sustainable performance arise when you concentrate on being present in the process of living instead of obsessing over outcomes, and above all when you’re finally Grounded wherever you are.”
Principles of Groundedness
- Acceptance: Accept where you are to get where you want to go
- Presence: Be present so you can own your attention and energy
- Patience: Be patient and you’ll get there faster
- Vulnerability: Embrace Vulnerability to develop genuine strength and confidence
- Deep Community: Build Deep Community
- Movement: Move your body to ground your mind
Living a Grounded Life
The principles of a Grounded Life aren’t meant to be merely thought of, Stulberg reminds us that “You don’t become what you think. You become what you do. Living a grounded life starts with a mindset shift, but it continues as an ongoing practice.” Where I think this advice is most relevant is in regards to taking action and overcoming the “analysis paralysis” or other such impediment to action. When action is halted and you are so focused on your plan or your thoughts, dissonance follows. Dissonance is the discomfort that accompanies inconsistencies between your thoughts, feelings, and beliefs and your actions. I think this hesitancy to action and ultimately the dissonance that follows stems from the Heroic Individualism and it’s emphasis on the outcome as the “only arbiter of success.” When you are so focused on the outcome, you limit your actions – whether to protect yourself from failure or to give yourself a way out if something better comes along. Ultimately you protect your ego. Stulberg’s approach to Groundedness emphasizes that living with Groundedness is an ongoing practice, one that revolves around the Being-Doing Cycle and practicing actions that revolve around principles. In response to the “analysis paralysis” and hesitation to action, the Being-Doing cycle reminds us that “…your inner way of being influences what you do, but what you do also influences your inner way of being.” When we are experiencing dissonance, it is likely that our Being-Doing is out of alignment. Moving forward and taking action will in turn give you the mood to keep going, or as Stulberg reminds us, “Mood follows Action”.
Moving forward with this new practice, one of the final thoughts Stulberg concludes with is to choose simplicity over complexity. In an age of high tech gadgets and pervasive attention to productivity, it is easy to allow yourself to get overwhelmed and spread thin across multiple to do lists, calendars, and projects. Stulberg simplifies the evolution here by describing it as: Simple to Complex to Simple. I have found this as a great synthesis to describe the productivity and self development evolution in my life. Early on in your development journey, you focus on certain habits and routines. Eventually you could grow to add the technology (wearables, electronic calendars, hacks, etc) to give you that extra edge in your development. This is where the complexity comes in and ultimately, perhaps, where we get off the path. When we are so hooked on tracking our habits or productivity for the sake of productivity, we get lost in the complexity. We choose productivity rather than productive activity. This is the bedrock of Heroic Individualism. Practicing Groundedness helps us pull ourselves through this complexity, returning to simplicity again, with new eyes; “…We often make things more complex than they need to be as a way to avoid the reality that what really matters for behavior change is consistently showing up and doing the work. Not dreaming about it. Not thinking about it. Not talking about it. Doing it”
Quotations:
“Life satisfaction is largely a by-product of transitioning from being a seeker, or someone who wants a certain lifestyle, to a practitioner, or someone who lives that lifestyle.”
“Do not worry about achieving a specific result. Focus on being where you are and applying the principles of Groundedness to the best of your ability right now. If you concentrate on the process the results you are hoping for tend to take care of themselves.”
“Bring intentionality to everything you do, keep coming back to the principles of Groundedness and your actions for living them out.”
“Do not compare yourself to others. Compare yourself to prior versions of yourself and judge yourself based on the effort you are exerting in the present moment.”
“Practice means approaching an endeavor deliberately, with care, and with intention to continually grow. It requires paying close attention to feedback you receive – both internal and from external sources you trust – and adjust accordingly.”
“When an activity becomes a practice, it shifts from something that you are doing at a point in time to an ongoing practice of becoming.”
Similar Books/Further Reading:
Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility by James P. Cares
The Joy of Movement: How Exercise Helps Us Find Happiness, Hope, Connection, and Courage by Kelly McGonigal
Fatherly by Seth Simons
Previous Commonplace Book Entries
The Brain That Changes Itself by Doidge
New to the site? Start here at my Latest Post or learn more about my site at the About section. Thanks for stopping by!