When I was a journalist, I’d pitch a story, get the assignment, do the research and interviews, then finesse the words so the story sang on the page. It was fun, it was poetic, it was artistic. It was a simple process, really.

PR and Marketing can be simple but whenever people are involved in a process, it somehow gets muddled.

Picture this: I’m in a meeting with a client and I lay out all the possibilities of what Your People LLC can do to bring attention to their company, to their product, to their event.

We can tell their stories to the media and hope they’ll pick up on it. But then the client has to deliver on the increased attention.

We can tell their stories in ads on the radio, on TV, in newspapers, and online. But then the client has to deliver on the increased attention.

We can plan events to drive people into the store or place of business. When we get the people there, the client has to deliver on the increased attention.

It’s all about relationships and about follow-through. There are the steps that companies like mine create to drive traffic and attention. And then there are the processes that a company has to have in place, seamlessly and without fail, to handle the what-happens-now.

Seth Godin wrote a great blog yesterday about doing the work. Back when I was Orthodox, I read a book called Thou Shalt Not Want, about the religious take on work and income. Its quick point: you have to do the appropriate amount of work to earn enough - not kill yourself, not slough off.

Bottom line: Marketing and Public Relations do not include a magic wand to instantly make more money and nab more customers. We all have to do the work and build relationships in order to improve business. Bottom line.

A cold Saturday afternoon and I snuggled beneath my dancing bears blanket to watch a Jennifer Aniston movie I’d never heard of, Rumor Has It. I confess - I’m a sucker for chick flicks, especially with hot actors like Aniston and Kevin Costner. (There were so many more - it’s actually not a bad movie.)

And of course, like any suburban sap, I teared up at the end when the gorgeous tanned protagonist has her a-ha! moment and realizes that while she was chasing dreams and yearning to find herself, she knew who she was all along.

So many of us do that. Right here in this blog I’ve waxed and whined in poetic fashion about the laments of my roots, the failings of family. There are many. But in doing so, what have I created? Nothing but a bitchfest.

And so where we are left at mid-life or possibly later is with the supreme and sincere knowledge that all these external factors - the people who create bumps in the road, those who pass judgment on us and our choices, and those who stand in our way as the obstacles they intend to become - none of that matters.

The stronger I am, the less I *need* anyone to approve. I can live this life in sublime love with myself and my children and my sweet man and that is enough. Saturdays in sunlight (oh, how I miss the warm weather!), strolling through the farmer’s market, and evenings with the windows open and fireflies flashing their moments past the windowscreen.

The softest cup of Cline cashmere, and the deer that hop over my fence into my yard just to track along the snow. My 8-year-old boy has asked to see the fairy doors in Ann Arbor and yes, he wants those hours with me in adventurous seeking, and I gobble them up like a starving child.

I just read Thomas Lynch’s The Undertaking, and in those pages I found so many tidbits of wisdom, like “the meaning of our lives, and the memories of them, belong to the living…”

Yes - those of us who truly learn how to be present, we are the lucky ones who truly LIVE in the moments we are given. And that is where the meaning is. Not in the yearning to travel more or the wishing-we’d-done-things-differently. Or the I-must-have-answers-NOW.

“We remember because we want to be remembered,” Lynch writes. And it is true for why else would we linger in the already-happeneds and bite our nails in anticipation of the what-comes-next?

So here’s the upshot on a late Saturday in winter. Forty-nine states are blanketed in snow and California has launched a major advertising campaign to lure people to the west coast.

All around me, there are people with issues sprouting out of their skin like spores, and I just don’t care enough to get embroiled in their mishegoss. Day in and day out, I am amazed by the lengths to which people will go to mask their discomfort by dumping on others, including me.

But I have come so far that I no longer care. I do good work, I love deeply and well, and I am a success in my meager life. Every single day, I thank the good lord above for the gems in my midst and I cherish these moments, like little gifts in Tiffany blue, so that I am acutely aware of my living-breathing existence.

To everyone who professes askance at the steps I take and the choices I make, my mouth turns up in compassion and my brow wrinkles. That’s just too bad, I whisper to the wind. And though what they may need most is a hug, it’s no longer my job to break their fall.

Bone up, people. We are the masters of our own destinies, we are the creators of our moments. Take ownership. Live well.

First begin your day by downloading Seth Godin’s free e-book here.

Then read it. If you know anything about me, you’ll know that I am a huge fan of Seth Godin and his innovative perspective on marketing and business. I push the Purple Cow whenever possible and revisit it periodically for a jump-start in my own business. It sits on my desk, behind my business check register and to the left of my computer. Suffice it to say, this book is a seminal text guiding me.

And so it was a no-brainer to download Seth’s book about What Matters Now when I found the link on ReadTheSpirit. He says:

We’re rewarded for being generous.

If you make a difference, people will gravitate to you.

If you make a difference, you also make a connection.

I’m also reading a preview copy of Rebecca Rosen’s book Spirited, which makes its debut February 2nd. She talks about finding the purpose in our lives and pursuing it. Because we’re all here to accomplish something and, as I tell my kids, to make the world a better place.

Each of us has something unique to contribute in our time on earth - if only we realized that mission and focused our light and energy in that direction, instead of spinning wheels like so many of us do.

Think about your daily life. What matters to YOU? Are you doing something of worth in your daily work? Do you make a difference in the lives of others? When you go to sleep at night, are you satisfied that you’ve done all you can possibly do to create a community of connected individuals, in love and with integrity?

Because if you answered “um…NO” to any of the above, you’d better stop in your tracks and recalibrate. Focus your energy in a new direction. The time is now and there is never enough time.

It’s been a while since I’ve waxed poetic or philosophical or issued an unbridled rant - so, happy new year!

I used to walk through airports, wondering where people were going, why they were in such a hurry, imagining the stories behind the faces. And the faces - I admit, I grew up on 1980s pop culture brat pack movies and I believed beauty lurked in romance. Or maybe it was the other way around.

And I spent many years looking for the happy ending, the stunning match, the confirmation that life imitates movies or perhaps it was the other way around.

So last month, I ended a tumultuous year with four solo days in Mexico with a beach so vast and soft, I could have walked clear around the earth. In the early morning sun and in the setting sun at day’s end, I walked the sand, invigorated, inspired, ignited by the crash and ebb of ocean waves, marveling every time at the way it gave its gusto slam onto the shore only to pull back in retreat.

Again and again and again. The waves would always be there, rocking in shades of blue and screaming their utterances, then whispering them, too.

The marble floors were soothing. The winter-warm breezes like kisses. Sunshine, cloud cover, fish fresh from their catch, drinks sipped in soothing utterances. I read books. I took notes on Life As I Know It and sketched out Life As I Want It To Be.

And when I came home, this is what I had gathered:

* Every person should ask herself, if I could do anything, what would it be? Then do that thing.

* Instincts are the most powerful force we have. Listen to them.

* Money ceases to matter when there is no meaning attached. And even so, money comes and money goes. Shoot for the meaning.

I once read a very thin book of Jewish scriptural thought called Thou Shalt Not Want. It explained the Talmudic perspective on income, which was basically that if you exert the exact amount of effort required for whatever your task in life is, you will be fine.

You can kill yourself to work overtime, but that doesn’t mean you’ll end up with more cash jingling in your pocket. You can shlub around and do the bare minimum, but we all know that won’t cut it either.

The whole perspective, summed up in less than 120 pages, was, do what is required of you and you’ll be taken care of. Not a sit-and-let-the-Higher-Being-provide way of looking at things. A strive-for-balance-and-you’ll-get-happiness approach to the necessity of working for a living.

In this new year, this new decade, this second-third-fourth chance at starting over and creating new beginnings, do what really matters. Only you know what that is so only you can measure your success.

And banish all those outside voices. If they don’t get you, they never will.

from The Globe and Mail, June 27, 2009: “The authentic soul of Canada is the wilderness … A Canadian is someone who knows how to have sex in a canoe… If you want to feel truly Canadian, you’ve got to get out there and learn to paddle a canoe.”

I don’t know if any of the above is true, but I do know from spending a brief week last summer in the far southwest corner of Canada, that identity is all tied up in the water and the wilderness and the vessels that can safely take you from one point to the next. I personally hate canoeing - but I have never really considered what exactly cements my identity.

Is there something symbolic, some food, some task, some color, some hobby?

Consider this, from David Grossman, “The Age of Genius,” which appeared in the New Yorker, June 8 & 15, 2009:

“When I first heard about the life cycle of salmon, I felt that there was something very Jewish about it: that inner signal which suddenly resonates in the consciousness of the fish, bidding them to return to the place where they were born, the place where they were formed as a group. (There may also be something very Jewish in the urge to leave that homeland and wander all over the world - that eternal journey.)”

And later, in Saveur, in a story about Sheila Lukins, coauthor of The Silver Palate Cookbook: “Sheila’s love of cooking and her belief in its ability to enrich lives not only got her through tough situations - it was contagious.”

Food as a transmitter of identity, of experience, of relationship, of love - that’s not a novel concept but it is a true and powerful one. In feeding someone, in preparing a meal together and savoring the flavors, we are nourishing our souls.

Dana Goodyear wrote in “The Scavenger,” a New Yorker article from November 9, 2009, “Interesting cuisine often comes out of poverty…serve some actual hunger people have, rather than something they tell themselves they must have.”

It’s no secret that culture and identity are conveyed through the foods we eat. Our lifelong preferences harken back to our earliest days. Our tendencies, our proclivities, our choices - they all represent deep-seated feelings and desires, the desire to be ok, the desire to be loved, the desire to be a part of something significant.

When I was in college and in love with John, we’d banter back and forth about identity and faith. “How can you be so Jewish if you don’t know anything about it?” he challenged one day in his rented room with shaggy brown carpet. Queensryche ballads played on the stereo. His electric guitar stood at repose under the bunkbed.

But it was not an honest question. I mean it was, but there is so much more to who we are than what we know.

And the food part of this - in children’s books, the greatest punishment a parent can bestow is to send a child to bed without supper. Why? Because there is no possibility of withholding love or money or sex, all the things we as adults toy with in an effort toward control and power. Children are pure and innocent and simple - and their need to receive love, and to give it, is vast.

My children have said simple things in moments of crisis. When I’ve felt sad or angry or frustrated or self-doubting, one of them will say, “Well then why are you fill-in-the-blank, Mommy? Do something else, befriend someone else, go somewhere else.” Simple. And true.

Why were there always things she wished she hadn’t done?

For her entire life, the girl had made choices that at the moment seemed brilliant, but in retrospect were entirely misguided. And this was certainly one of them. Except that even in the moment, she knew it was the wrong direction to walk.

Of course, she didn’t want to spend her life looking behind her. What good would that do? In addition to making her dizzy, it would simply confuse the focus.

And now, she could look completely forward and focus on what was right in front of her. Goodness. Honesty. True authenticity instead of cruelty masquerading. The work the work the work.

She could finally do what does best - create, inspire, weave stories. She could focus wholly on her kids. No more maniacs, no more catering the needs of insecurity.

Freedom, she realized, was the ability to not let another control her moments, not quiver under the gaze of a scrutinizing and unhappy behemoth. She knew, and she had always known, that happiness and strength come from within. If others didn’t realize that, she would not be the one to try to fill their voids.

She’d had enough of doing that and done it more than she’d like. But yesterday is gone and today is a new day, and she reminded herself that she’s always been scrappy, always been kind, always worked with integrity as well as passion.

And so, long before the dawn of a Thursday peeked its head over the trees, she sat in the low lights of her office and breathed deeply. In the next room, her son lolled on the couch with cartoons. Upstairs, the other two slept in darkened rooms.

And the night before, they’d snuggled as a family in her bed, watching The Jetsons and The Flintstones and she had realized that these vestiges of her own childhood were unfamiliar to her own children. You see all the wonderful things to discover together? she said to herself.

Life is too full, too rich, too wonderful, to wallow in the mistakes of another. And with that, she went to sleep.

Claudia invited me to join her at a homeless shelter on Saturday morning. “My friend Marguerite is coming,” she told me on the phone. So we met at Marguerite’s house and they got in my car.

As we drove downtown, Marguerite mentioned, “My good friend Karen B.”

“Is that the same Karen B. who’s about 30 and cute and does yoga?” I asked.

“How do you know her?” Marguerite replied. “She’s like an adopted daughter to me.”

The volunteer event was part of Mitch Albom’s A Time to Heal organization. I wrote about Mitch after his new book came out, for ReadTheSpirit.com, which is run by my friend, David Crumm.

I met David years ago, after he wrote a stunning article comparing Starbucks to a church. He suggested we have coffee at Avalon Breads. I fell in love with Avalon and met Jackie and Ann, the proprietors. That story got me into Saveur.

I knew Karen B. because she’s done graphic design for me for my client and favorite yoga studio, Yoga Shelter. I went to Yoga Shelter because my childhood next-door neighbor, Laura C., dragged me there several years ago. I hated yoga prior; but in Justin’s class that first day, the music rockin’ loud and the sweat pouring down my skin, I had a revelation.

Exploring what the Shelter was all about, I drove to the home of founder Eric Paskel. He lived in the home where my aunt and uncle lived for a decade before they moved to Milwaukee for just a year. Across the street lives a friend I’ve known since middle school.

Yoga teacher Justin is friends with a son of Hiller’s CEO Jim Hiller. He helped me get in touch with Jim when I wanted to set out on a new career path. Jim took me under his wing and became a client, mentor friend.

When he was an attorney, Jim represented my late great-grandfather’s company. I’m named after Grandpa Louie. He had lunch at 11 a.m. every day at Roma Cafe. That’s where we celebrated my grandmother’s 86th birthday.

On the side of the highway, as we drove through winter ice and snow in the dark of night to get to that dinner, a homeless man sat bereft with a sign asking for help. My son Asher, 5 years old at the time, begged me to stop the car, get out and help.

“I can’t just now,” I said, “though I love that you want to help him. My first job is to protect you.”

And today, my young son, age 7 1/2, is a veritable activist - unplugging electronics, turning off lights, asking me to designate one day per week when do not use our car.

One degree of separation. I could go on for hours. We’re all connected.

The tree’s branches were heavy with bluebirds - so many of them, perching lightly as if they were smiling and content. The tree itself was deeply rooted in the earth, with a thick knobby trunk and branches like arms ready for an embrace. It seemed as if this particular tree could reach the sky if it just kept trying.

The tree represents growth and the bluebirds are all about confidence. You walk into a room and you know that you are the person to be noticed, that is how you carry yourself, she explained.

On the ceiling, tiny white Christmas lights shone from around the rafters. It was a peaceful moment and a heartening one, on the eve of a holiday dedicated to gratitude.

There are an increasing number of businesses today that convey their missions, their messages, in the very fabric of their storefronts. Lululemon, for one, with its messages of meaning hanging in word clouds above the cash registers. And even Starbucks. What brilliant concepts and they both have flocks of customers, like birds returning to a familiar nest.

In the book I bought by chance at a Starbucks recently, entitled 1: How many people does it take to make a difference?, I marveled at the message in the pages.

For a coffee shop to seek to produce a book for sale beside the treats and lattes, well, it’s a novel concept to begin with - but so is having a private record label on which famous performers agree to do exclusive projects. Brilliant marketing.

And this book, at a time when so many are teetering, it’s about living a life of meaning, not living a life of money. It’s not a book about making a living; it’s a book about making a life.

And so I put before you this very important question on a Monday morning in the last month of this year: What are you doing to make your life worth living? When you look back at the end of your days, what will you be glad you did? And what will be your imprint on this earth when you are gone?

A friend recently flew to Kathmandu for work. She spent 2 and a half days en route in order to improve the maternal-fetal health care system in that Nepal city at the foot of the world’s tallest peaks.

“I’m glad I go there on business,” she told me, “because I really get to meet the people and see how they live. If I went as a tourist, I’d spend my time in shops and restaurants - and that’s not the truth of a place.”

We all make choices every single day - we choose to live a certain way, choose to work in a certain field, select the people we surround ourselves with and whom we turn to for inspiration. I’ve been trying these past few months to clean house - eliminate the bad energy and make room only for the good. I sure hope you can do the same.

“Notice every transition.”

Donna, at the Grosse Pointe Yoga Shelter. Leading Monday morning Vinyasa. I swear I thought she called it Strong Vinyasa, only because the class was hard and made me focus early on a Monday about questions and question marks and fault lines.

She was talking about the fluid move from pose to pose, from Warrior 1 to Warrior 2 to Triangle pose to folding down and releasing through a push-up. Every change a chance to connect with the moment and the breath, with the thought and with the mind and yet to shut it off.

Notice every transition.

And the beauty of the statement was that she was really speaking on several levels. yes, the transition between poses but also the transitions in life, in relationships, in work and in play.

Aren’t we living in exceptional times? But really, all times are exceptional. What makes right now any harder? Is it that we have coasted for years, for decades, riding the wave of plenty and believing it would never crash to shore?

Notice the transitions. Which means that in the waiting, in the in-between, lies the challenge and the reward. In the transition, instead of focusing on the discomfort, the what-ifs and the fear, notice the actual BEING.

There is a bad energy circulating right now - whether from the economic recession of the past two years or because another year is ending and with it comes the transitional period until a new year and a new existence, a new way of doing things. It doesn’t mean we have to give in to the bad energy. Or that we even have to see it as BAD.

Perhaps it is alternative or confronting or arresting. Perhaps it is simply different. And the person who can shroud another in purple light as well as themselves and send out only positivity and joy and, well, love - that’s the person who will endure.

Transition that.

Hello old friend, where have you been?

I’ve been combing the nights late to find more time to breathe. And then the morning begins before dawn. Circling back unto itself, tether of warm air and the promise of a new day. I couldn’t help it. I was a cog in a cycle, stuck going round and round until someone other than myself pulled the lever down.

So stop. You, old friend, you know. Money is not love and loving yourself is more important and more challenging than any outside source. Stop the cycle. Take up with yourself and walk the freedom trail. Remember those moments?

You were scared because you couldn’t see the end of the road. But you started with the first step and then you felt the rush of cool air, reassuring freedom. You named the tall trees for that moment. You crystallized the ginger-sugar in the echo of your living room. If only you had refinished the wood floors by hand. Always outsourcing.

Yes. I do remember that. The autumn was ending into itself and the tall trees masked the brightness of the sky. We didn’t even broach the subject until after we’d eclipsed hill and fall and collapsed back into plush velvet chairs with coffee that was too strong.

It was such a simple question - where is your power? And it was rhetorical. You knew you didn’t need an answer. Why do you need one now?

Remember the fear? You carried it like a bundle around each wrist for seven years. And when it materialized into human form, it wasn’t anything to be afraid of. Remember that now.

There is power in the light, she said, and there is power in the dark. If you concentrate on the only thing that exists, right this minute like a daisy in your sweaty palm, you’ll be fine.

One moment continues into the next until you have a string of them, like white holiday lights strung along the sukkah top or dangling before the winter solstice. They are the same lights every time; it’s we who attach meaning to them. Connotation.

And so what is it, now, that gnaws at you?

She asked the question over and over, like a tunnel without end.

What is it? Can you see it?

Yes. She nodded into the echo. It’s that, by his stories, he negates my whole existence. I don’t even hover over the water. From the way he spins it, I was never there.

But I was. She exclaims this and punches into the air for emphasis. I was THERE! And the story spun out of control with different characters, a completely foreign setting.

Yesterday, the children found the word alien in literature to refer to persons from another land. Until that moment, they’d only known the term to mean outer space creatures.

How odd, the eldest said. Or something like that. That’s not even nice, to call them aliens.

It was a different time, the mother explained. Words take on meaning depending on who’s saying them and what the context.

But they had already moved on to another topic, another scene outside the window, another song on the radio.

Yes, she said. I remember the moment.