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Tomback speaks about everything from love to money, marriage to divorce, conflicts and controversies to control and commitment. And he doesn’t stop there. Spirituality and God are included in all aspects of the book, but not in a preachy sense; he speaks more in a universal manner with nurturing tendencies.
Reviewed by Joanne D. Kiggins
Spiriting Around A Modern Guide to Finding Yourself
By Martin “Mark” Tomback
Mooring Field Books
February 10, 2006, 304 pp. Softcover, ISBN: 0-9755248-0-1
Spriting Around: A Modern Guide to Finding Yourself is not the normal run-of-the-mill book about God and spirituality. Martin Tomback wrote the book with teens in mind; he hopes to help them understand various aspects of life and teach them to stand by their choices and be responsible for the choices they make.
The book is broken down into six chapters of easily understood, well-written steps in how to work toward goals, find what’s right for you and how to follow through to accomplish those goals.
Tomback speaks about everything from love to money, marriage to divorce, conflicts and controversies to control and commitment. And he doesn’t stop there. Spirituality and God are included in all aspects of the book, but not in a preachy sense; he speaks more in a universal manner with nurturing tendencies.
He uses a no-nonsense, common sense approach to speak about growing up and finding solutions to problems and explains how to be patient, persistent and stay focused.
There’s always a choice of solutions available; each with its own advantages, requirements, and costs. (25)
The “Start Here” (Chapter 1) talks about life’s resistance, finding solutions, patience and persistence, staying focused and finding your way with dignity and spiritual support and faith.
“The Reason Why” (Chapter 2) explains how to go about deciding what values to live by, finding yourself, understanding your influences, making goals and barriers and believing in yourself.
“Money” (Chapter 3) deals with finding jobs, getting established, beginning your own business and making it a success. He doesn’t stop there. There are suggestions about investing, marketing, getting credit, making budgets and filing taxes.
“Love” (Chapter 4) talks about everything from puppy love to how to love, and breaks down differences between friends and romance. Discussion and suggestions about marriage, divorce and parenting is also included in this chapter.
“Conflicts & Controversies” (Chapter 5) gets to the heart of right and wrong and truth and lies. From living by the rules to approaching a conflict, readers should gain a full understanding of society’s rules, making decisions, standing by what he believes and the spiritual value of each lesson learned.
This chapter (the longest in the book) goes into an alphabetical list of such things as abortion to zoning with thought provoking statements about each.
“The Expedition Continues” (Chapter 6) encourages the reader to continue exploring regardless of life’s situation. This paragraph pretty much sums up life and this book for this reader.
Changes uncover new answers to the mystery of our experience. They reveal new questions as we look at what’s exposed beyond our understanding. If we see ourselves as microcosms of the process then the universe is a system of maturity where questions are reviewed from evolving stages of growth. So through us the universe looks deeper into itself as human history records it. Through love God finds completeness in this limitlessness. So God grows up forever.(290-291)
Each chapter ends with a “Spiriting Around Exercise,” or “Think About It” section, which summarizes the thoughts brought out in the chapter.
In Spiriting Around: A Modern Guide to Finding Yourself, Mark Tomback has taken his school of hard knocks and summed them up into an easy-to-read instruction book to help others understand their life’s situations and how to make the best of them despite the difficulties in this modern world.
About the reviewer: Joanne Kiggins has published more than 2,500 articles. Her most recent articles were published in ByLine Magazine, Writer’s Digest, Absolute Write, Moondance, The Compulsive Reader, BlogCritics, Amazon Reviews, Everything New Orleans, Everything Jersey, Penn Live, MLive, Mass Live, Everything Alabama and the Plain Dealer. Her essay,"Perseverance," is published in the Stories of Strength anthology written in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, for which 100% of the profits will be donated to various disaster relief charities. She is currently writing a mystery suspense novel. Visit her site and her blog.
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