Books — Life Changes by Michael G. Upchurch

Michael had, for many years, toyed with the thought of writing a book. Early on, he envisioned smoking a pipe on the front porch of a mountain cabin, with the aroma of the fireplace burning while he wrote.

Things have changed since then. Michael doesn't smoke anymore and hasn't been back to that cabin since. Time passed, along with many of life's responsibilities, and he eventually decided to begin documenting his life experiences.

Michael chose to follow a path inspired by three authors he admired: Lewis Grizzard, Erma Bombeck, and Jeanne Robertson, whose styles fit more appropriately with how he viewed his own life experiences.

Michael soon realized that life is full of good and bad experiences. He captured that idea in the story "You Meet the Strangest People at a Bar." While sitting at a restaurant having a beverage, he looked at the other patrons and wondered what their lives were like.

Everybody has a story — some good and some bad, some interesting and some boring, but always a story to document.

Michael captured his good, bad, and even boring times in a lighthearted manner. The book spans from a time when, as a boy, his values were initially formed, through his teenage years, when Michael realized that he wasn't too smart in his early years.

He noted that the same observation could probably apply to anybody's current life.

Michael's career has been built upon quality. He firmly believes in validating events, conversations, and documentation. For some, this is called fact-checking.

Michael believes the content of this book can be applied to all ages.

The book is not designed to provide a step-by-step process for dealing with everyday life. Rather, it offers a common-sense and humorous view of how one person approached life's good and bad events. This is Michael's story and his approach to those events, told with humor and reflection.

The book is also not intended to replace professional advice. There are many books and professional resources available that provide more in-depth approaches to addressing life's challenges and understanding how those events affect an individual.

With that said, Michael does believe that finding the "silver lining in every cloud" can help boost one's confidence and improve one's approach to life.

Rather than presenting a formula for how others should live, this book provides a view into Michael's life, the events he encountered, how those events affected him, and how he chose to meet them head-on. Michael uses stories to reflect on those experiences and the lessons that emerged from them.

So, enjoy traveling back in time with Michael — from when we were young and naive to the later years of life, when one may still be naive.