I'm trying something new this week. I'm having an adventure in publishing. This is exciting and nerve-wracking at the same time. I've written more words than many people, having blogged before, but I've never written a book. And why write one book when you could write two? Well, one is going to be more of a booklet, but still, it's a real publishable work that I intend to ask people to pay me money for.

I am self-publishing them because that's the cutting edge of where the book market is headed. Many people are increasingly comfortable with reading electronic books, or ebooks to those of us with more inner-geek, on e-reader devices. These devices are not just limited to Nooks and Kindles. Now you can read electronic books on smart phones and tablets including iPads. About the only place that it's difficult to read an electronic book these days is on paper, and even then you can print a copy of your PDF if you really must read from dead tree.

I'm using a service called LeanPub, of which many of you will not have heard, but they specialize in self-publishing electronic books. I've read a few other books from their authors and have been impressed enough that I'm going to try them. The difference with LeanPub is that they promote an agile approach to publishing. This needs some explaining, so settle back and I'll explain what that means.

We've all heard the classic descriptions of different perspectives of a glass of water:

• The optimist sees the glass as half full.
• The pessimist sees the glass as half empty.

But then I got to wondering how many other perspectives I could come up with. Let's see how I do:

Bulldog perception:

Once in a while you will stumble upon the truth but most of us manage to pick ourselves up and hurry along as if nothing had happened.

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (1874-1965)

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:

Deuteronomy 6:4

How cool is this! There is a verse of scripture that has a name! Deuteronomy 6:4 is the verse. It's name is the Shema (pronounced sha-mah) and is named for the first word in the Hebrew sentence. Shema means "hear", but with the context of taking notice and being obedient to what is heard.

(Note: Some call it Shema Yisrael, naming it from both the first and second words.)

In my New Year 2014 post, I mentioned that I do not make new year resolutions, but that I do strive to work on what I have called Projects For Life. It seems reasonable to now describe what I mean and to explain how this not only differs from a new year resolution but is, in fact, much better.

New Year resolutions, in theory, are when people make a decision for a positive thing in their life. This could be anything that they have identified in their life that needs improvement. Usual candidates include losing weight, stopping bad habits, exercising more or eating right. And there is nothing wrong with any of these resolutions. But the practice is that the resolution is set, high enthusiasm carries the person through a few days or even a week or two and then at the first failure, they give up and say forget it. This explains why a typical gym is full of new members in early January, but almost exclusively back to just the regulars by February 1st.

New year resolutions don't work for most of us because they are conceived of as a grand plan where anything less than complete success on the first attempt is a complete failure. Grand plans are great in theory, but the reality is that no plan survives first contact with reality. And that means that you will almost never hit a large goal on a first try. And therefore, despite oodles of good intention and well meaning, you have set yourself up for failure. After a few rounds of failed resolutions, many people say forget it and make the only new year resolution that they'll ever keep and say that they'll never again make a new year resolution!