It’s February [of course] and many associate the month of February with love. We inadvertently fell into the love trap this month as well. Sorry!  But I promise, not in a gushy, St. Valentine’s sort of way...no Hallmark moments running amuck. Instead attribute’s writers somehow decided to focus on “loving thyself”: From comparing yourself to, or envying others, to loving yourself enough NOT to take the baggage accumulated during your 20’s with you into your 30’s, even buying diamonds from a company that protects the people mining them and the earth, to loving people in general. You’ll see, there are many forms of love...choose one or all.

Love is a topic that people either like to discuss or want to avoid altogether.  I choose to discuss it and I am actually quite fascinated by how people love one another: good, bad or indifferently. I am taking a class based on the research of Dr. Catherine Leaf, a South African educated, Zimbabwean born, PhD, who specializes in Communication Pathology (say that three times fast). In her book, Who Switched Off My Brain, Dr. Leaf discusses how our thought process does in fact affect every aspect of our lives, from our health to how we learn and love. It’s fascinating; I plan to write an extensive review for a future issue and hope to interview her (so if you know her, put in a good word for me, please).

But I digress...

One thing I do ask of you, this month and every month: Please love yourselves, your spouse, children and neighbors to the best of your ability.  If it’s something you struggle with, take a look inside and figure out why.  We all have such great potential to love and support one another, so much better than we may now. If you don’t struggle with it...how awesome and bravo! Share your secret with people to enable and empower them to have that knowledge as well. Touch someone with it...for there is no greater gift than that of love.

We just put up our January podcast and I have to say, R.J. the D.J. outdid himself—it’s terribly sexy in a smooth sort of way. You’ll have to listen to see what I mean. It’s so wonderful we are discovering such a treasure trove of talent to share with our readers (and listeners) and helping to expand your music library and their careers.  The 'love' connection is also within our podcast (check out the list of featured artists to see the connect...I swear R.J. and I did not confer on this for a second).

You may have realized I haven't been writing for attribute as much as I normally do.  I am writing...just doing so for other purposes and choosing to focus my writer's mind on these other projects for now.  I pray over the fruition of said projects and allowing myself to be less involved in writing for attribute was not an easy decision, but a necessary one.  I will be contributing, just not as much. This month I opted out of contributing an article but you will find a poem I wrote several years ago here (click on 'here').  And be sure to check out my blog for updates, ponderings and fun stuff!

I have no idea what is in store next month...you’ll just have to come back or check our Facebook, Twitter or MySpace pages or join our new networking site on Ning: http://attributemagazine.ning.com/ for information.

Thank you as always for reading!

Warmest regards,

Stacey R. Louiso

Founding Editor, Executive/Creative Dir.

& Editor-in-Chief