The Top 10 Tips for Creating a Press Release that Gets You National Publicity.

1. Create an outrageous headline. Ho-hum headlines do not get read. Reporters are busy people. If your headline does not hit them between the eyes, it will get tossed.

2. Make an outrageous claim in your headline that you can back up. If you have helped bring a business out of bankruptcy, that skill is transferable to another business. A headline stating "Turnaround expert can help anyone out of bankruptcy" will attract lots of attention. Make sure you can back up your claim.

3. A well-written press release does not tell the whole story. The purpose of your press release is not to give all the information up front, but to create an interest so that the media will want to interview you.

4. Your press release must have a time designation for its release. "For immediate release" tells them that they can use your release anytime between the time you sent it and infinity. "For release during tax season" tells them there is a specific time when your information will be valuable to the readers.

5. A well-written press release is only one 8 1/2 x 11 page long. Again, reporters are busy people. They don't have time for a lot of verbiage.

6. Your headline must meet the "who cares" rule. The announcement of the opening of your new office is boring. Who cares? On the other hand, if you are announcing your grand opening and offering a free, valuable service to the reader, that is worthy of media attention.

7. No blatant promotions, please. The press release is not designed to sell your product/service; this is a turn-off to the media. The goal is to get you noticed by offering the readers valuable information that they can use immediately, whether they buy your product/service or not.

8. Create a new slant for your release. Every reporter wants to have a new spin on a ho-hum story. Give them the opportunity to stand out in the crowd and you will be the media sweetheart.

9. Tie your press release to a holiday event. A press release that is relevant during a particular holiday event will get immediate attention.

10. Let the first paragraph (no more than 3 sentences) tell them what the press release is about. Again, too much verbiage will not be read. Be succinct, get to the point, create interest without selling.

The Top 10 Indications that You May be Codependent.

There is a very fine line between being a kind, giving person, and being codependent. We used to think that codependents existed only in conjunction with someone else's addiction but it is now understood as a problem in its own right. The biblical Martha, rushing around, choosing to be "cumbered with much serving," but becoming highly resentful while she does it, is considered by some to be illustrative of codependency. Of the symptoms below, some may simply indicate your generous and selfless nature. However, if they occur often enough to prevent you from living your own life, then think carefully about why you do what you do. Some signs that may indicate codependency are:

1. You spend a lot of time doing things for others, but you also feel resentful about it.

2. You rarely do anything for yourself or spend anything on yourself beyond bare essentials, and you have forgotten what "having fun" feels like.

3. You find it easier to say yes, and feel badly about doing whatever you agreed to, than to say no in the first place.

4. In relationships, you treat your partner as well as you hope s/he will eventually treat you, and wonder why s/he doesn't follow your example. You allow this to continue indefinitely.

5. You find yourself sacrificing some of your values to fit in with how your partner or friends choose to live.

6. When friends and family are in trouble you see it as your responsibility to save them, even if they brought the problem on themselves, even if they need to learn from their own consequences if ever they are to change.

7. You allow others to invade your boundaries because it makes youfeel needed.

8. Even though your own life is in order, you attract dysfunctional people who immediately start to depend on you. You allow this.

9. You have difficulty thinking about yourself as central to your life. Even if asked about yourself, you somehow end up talking about the people who are in your life rather than about you.

10. If you were drowning, someone else's life would flash before your eyes.

The Top 10 Popcorn Thoughts part 1 I call these popcorn thoughts. You know those that pop out of your head and you catch them on paper before they hit the ground. Their purpose? To make you think a little deeper, fuller, a bit more different. Watchout, they are short and sweet. 1. When we give more, we get more to give more. 2. Those dying in the darkness will seek a light. 3. We let the little rob us of the important, and there are only a few things that are important. 4. Your blessing is incomplete until it is shared with someone else. 5. What you are is not what you have. 6. Don't hide with your pride or you will lose all that is dear to you. 7. Growth grows out of loss. 8. Your comfort is afflicted so you can be a comfort to the afflicted. 9. No one has the right to stay offended. 10. Telling people what you think doesn't help you know what others think. You already know what you think.

The Top 10 Popcorn Thoughts part 2 Here they come again. Those little kernels that exploded in my head. 1. Deep holes don't go away because you fell in one once. 2. To know what to do is different than to do it. 3. Your works don't get you to your destination, they describe your destination. 4. When you only know what you know, you don't know much else. 5. Until you are content with what you have, it is doubtful you will be pleased with more. 6. We can be going through hell, but we don't have to stop there. 7. Life isn't easy, life isn't fair, but life will be joyful if God is there. 8. Have the attitude: I am going to learn something new, meaningful, and helpful. As an artist freehands something three-dimensional on a two-dimensional canvas. 9. You choose your attitude: to forget the old and reach for the new. 10. Our problem is not so much what we do, as what we don't do.

The Top 10 Popcorn Thoughts part 3 Here they come again. Little reflections that may turn into deep insight. If they spark a thought in you then they serve a purpose. 1. Lord, grow me beyond me. Effecting only one is not enough. 2. We're not necessarily responsible for how the results pan out. We are responsible for how we react to how they pan out. 3. To get life, give life. To get hope, be a container for trust. To get light, expose the darkness. 4. Don't die chasing the wrong thing. You may be disapointed. 5. You are what is on the inside of you. Not what is on the outside you. 6. What is at the headwaters of your actions? Goodness or something less. 7. The mind migrates to what it deems is important. Is that where you want it to be? 8. How sad it is to have a great love and not be able to have others see it. 9. Better to win the fight than just be on the winning side. 10. Commitment means you will pay any price to see it through.

The Basics
Quit work for a year: 7 steps to do it right
Taking a break may be just the thing to spark your spirits. But keep in mind these seven points to ensure that your mini-retirement doesn't turn into maxi-regret.

It's time for a break. It's something everyone thinks about on occasion, but now an increasing number of people are taking mid-career sabbaticals as a way to refresh their creativity, or to do things they've always wanted to do.

Financial planners sometimes call it a "mini-retirement," in which you trade a couple of years while you're still in your 30s, 40s or 50s for working a little longer in your later years.
The reasons vary. Maybe you want to travel, go back to school, spend quality time with your family, volunteer or pursue your favorite hobby full time. Taking time off from work may be the only way you can follow these dreams, or just undo the damage to yourself and your family from job-related stress.

Sounds great in theory, but how do you pull it off? We will leave it to you to figure out what to do on your sabbatical, but here's how you can balance your desire for time off and your desire to keep your financial goals (such as a secure retirement) on track:

1. A leave of absence is (usually) better than quitting outright.
Unless your financial situation is very secure, and you don't need the group health insurance available through work, try for a leave of absence. (You also have the benefit of borrowing from your 401(k)). Understand that your employer can't keep your specific job open forever; the longer your sabbatical is, the less likely it is that you will be able to come back to your current position. Your employer may think a six-week sabbatical is terrific and will help you recharge your batteries to become a better employee; a six-month sabbatical (especially in a small company or a fast-paced one where products are brought to market very quickly) may be impossible to negotiate.

2. Accept that it's going to cost you.
Unless your employer offers you paid sabbatical time, you're going to have to take unpaid leave (or resign outright). Many a person has taken a sabbatical and rationalized the hit to the pocketbook with "I will be a better worker and much happier and focused, so I'll end up making much more money." That's great if it happens, but don't count on it. If anything, after a sabbatical you might decide you don't want to work as hard, or that you want to change your career to something less lucrative but more altruistic.

3. Figure out how much it's going to cost you.
We know this takes some of the spontaneity and fun out of the planning, but you need to know the bottom line in order to know how much time you can afford to take off. If you don't do it now, keep a detailed record of your monthly expenses for six months, subtracting out work-related costs (such as dry cleaning, lunches out, commuting costs) and adding in the extra costs of your sabbatical plans (such as travel, home renovation, and so on). Don't forget to also add in expenses that your employer pays now but that you will have to pay if you take a leave of absence or quit (such as medical expenses). Multiply your monthly basic expenses times the number of months you plan to be off work, and add in the extra costs of your sabbatical activities. Unless you will have a guaranteed job waiting for you upon your return, add at least three extra months for job hunting.

4. Set goals for your sabbatical.
This doesn't mean planning every day of your time off, but it does mean thinking through exactly what you want to achieve, both practically and personally.

5. Figure out how much time is enough to meet those goals.
Again, you don't want to sacrifice some spontaneity in your time off, but unless your employer subsidizes you, every month you take off is going to cost you. You can plan for an open-ended sabbatical if you have a nice financial cushion and you're willing to use it, but there's a law of diminishing returns at work. For example, after six months off, the seventh month of free time is going to be less beneficial to you. At some point, the money you lose by continuing to stay out of the work force becomes more important to you than the extra free time.

6. Find the money.
Now that you know how much money you will need, you have to come up with it. Make a list of all of your assets, including any non-financial assets you might be willing to sell (this can be just the motivation you need to clean out your house and have the Mother of All Garage Sales). Here is a quick snapshot of the various sources of income and some quick strategies to remember with each:

If you take money out of investments, subtract the capital gains tax you will have to pay. Remember that long-term capital gains (investments held more than 12 months) are taxed at 20%, but short-term capital gains are taxed at your marginal tax rate.

If you take money out of savings, be sure you leave an emergency fund of about three months' worth of expenses in a checking or savings account; many people who have taken sabbaticals have reported that they vastly underestimated their expenses, even when they tried to plan.

You could also go for a home equity loan, but take the loan proceeds well before you announce your plan for a sabbatical. If you are on unpaid leave, it's going to be hard to get that loan approved.

Another source is retirement plans; take loans if you can, instead of outright distributions. That's because an early distribution from your retirement plan carries a 10% penalty, plus you get taxed at ordinary income rates on the amount of money you took out. If your company will give you a leave of absence instead of making you quit, you probably can borrow from your 401(k) plan. Remember, though, that if you don't go back to that company and your employment status is terminated, your loan must be paid back to the 401(k) plan immediately.

You might decide to take a loan against the cash values of your life insurance policy, or to cash in an annuity. Before you do that, however, find out about the surrender charges. That includes any mutual funds that have back-end loads.

If your parents are making annual gifts to you already or you know they would support your desire to take time off, you can ask for a parental loan. Of course, you can ask for an advance on your inheritance, but it's probably better if you ask for a loan and let them offer on the inheritance.

If you plan to take substantial time off and you don't need a car, you might sell your car and use those funds. But before you do that, make sure you know where you will get the money to buy a replacement car when it's time to re-enter the work force. If you have taken a lot of time off, it may be hard to get a car loan before you have held onto a new job for a period of time.

7. Make exit and entrance plans.
Since the job market is so tight right now and employers are offering all kinds of incentives to prospective workers, you may be tempted just to quit and figure out your next job move at the end of your sabbatical. Bad move. To be fair to your current employer, you need to give at least three months notice if you're hoping to make it a leave of absence. This way, your temporary replacement can be trained and you make it clear that you care about your job and your employer. Even if you decide later not to come back to your current job, your supervisor will be more likely to provide a good recommendation.

If we all lived life "by the numbers," we would never take vacations or sabbaticals, would never have kids and would never do anything unnecessary that costs any money. There are some things that money can't buy, and a sabbatical may be just what it takes for you to find it.

Yes, you are probably going to end up with less money a year from now, five years from now and 20 years from now. The goal is for you to plan your time off in advance, make sure you can swing your finances so you don't have money worries while you are supposed to be de-stressing and not find yourself saying, "I wish I had never taken that time off; it just wasn't worth it" at any time in the future.

The Top 10 Limitations of a Satisfied Soul If there is room to grow, then there is more to know. But it won't be achieved, with a satisfied soul. 1. If our gas tank is already full, we can't add more to it. 2. If we are arrogant with what we know, nothing new will be detected. 3. If our minds are already made up, there is little room for change. 4. If we believe there is no problem with us, then everything else will be our problem. 5. If we believe things are hopeless and unchangeable, we are telling our souls we are satisfied to remain dissatisfied. 6. If we avoid moving to a higher level, then we are satisfied with our present fear of danger. 7. If we only have faith for the little, we can never experience the big. 8. If we are satisfied with proving our point, we will never learn the insight of another. 9. If we ever stop climbing up, we will find ourselves sliding down. 10. If we ever give up, we will lose what we will never know.

E-mail me to have your quote added

Thank you for visiting my page at Angelfire. Please come back and visit again!