When my father died in 1992, I realized that I had been largely following in his footsteps, grossly underselling the value of my own opinions given his vastly greater experience and wisdom. In my thirties and forties I did what I should have in my twenties: formed my own viewpoint, developed my own relationships, became my own man.

By 2003, I had completed a thorough examination of my spiritual beliefs, developed emotional awareness and maturity, and gotten a glimpse of what I wanted to focus on for the rest of my life. Then I got really lucky, and met my soul mate Debbie, who I married a year later.

Suddenly I had some strong opinions, which I felt were at least as valuable as anyone else's. I decided to share these with the world on my own Web site in what I called "Thoughts of the Day." They included a wide range of topics, from personal musings to politics, religion, and philosophy.

My moral compass had been reset to favor what enabled humanity to survive and thrive the longest. In 2006, I started a Web log (blog), "IdeaExplorer," that chronicled the mental map I was drawing by following that compass, along with the theoretical and empirical underpinnings I was discovering and developing along the way. Eventually the bulk of the background research became too big for my blog; so in 2008 I created another Web site, "Bigpicexplorer," dedicated to providing the detail behind my blog postings.

I had meanwhile revisited one of my favorite hobbies, creative writing, which included poetry, short stories, and essays that grew out of my "thoughts." One of the short stories even grew into a novel.

In late 2008, with both my wife and I out of work, I took a stab at getting paid for my writing, beginning with posting some of my work to Web sites such as Associated Content and Triond. With most of my time spent looking for a job, my writing slowed to a trickle, though I was by then committed to charting, describing, and fully utilizing my moral map.

Since then, I have done more contract work, continued my research, and done a lot more writing which has branched into several blogs.

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