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Contact: Barbara Burgess
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Finding More Life, Love, and Meaning by Overcoming Your SOFT ADDICTIONS
by Judith Wright

"A timely book that reminds us that the physical, emotional and spiritual nourishment we seek can be ours once we begin to let go of habitual behaviors."
— Deepak Chopra

"Judith Wright has written an inspiring and rich text that will motivate any reader to believe it is possible to heal all addictions."
— Caroline Myss, author of Anatomy of the Spirit and Sacred Contracts

"It is very revealing just how much of what we do follows certain recurring patterns we are barely aware of, if at all. Judith Wright shares with you insights that will alter your self-perspective forever. And that's a good thing!"
— James Redfield, author of The Celestine Prophecy

"Sometimes a small shift in perspective can open up a new world. That's what Judith Wright helps people do. She shows us how to transcend the numbing pressures of life and emerge into a transformed, fulfilling level of existence. If you have the feeling that there is more to life awaiting you, this could be the nudge you need."
— Larry Dossey, MD, author of Healing Beyond the Body, Reinventing Medicine, and Healing Words

Imagine you could craft a new life for yourself from scratch. Would your game plan include three hours of television a night, another hour surfing the Internet, and mindless moments thumbing through mail order catalogs, chatting on the phone or eating out of boredom? Probably not. So why choose it now? Yet many of us find ourselves stuck in time wasting behaviors and avoiding a world so filled with possibility and potential. Author Judith Wright says the culprit that gets between us and our dreams, goals, and potential is our "Soft Addictions." In her new book, THERE MUST BE MORE THAN THIS: Finding More Life, Love, and Meaning By Overcoming Your Soft Addictions (Broadway Books, March 25, 2003), she helps identify these insidious every day addictions and guides readers on a path to more meaningful and genuinely happier lives. Wright, an educator, trainer, and co-founder of the Wright Institute for Lifelong Learning in Chicago, has created a complete program of 8 key life skills that¹s been used by hundreds of her students to overcome their soft addictions and open up their lives to a greater sense of purpose and happiness. THERE MUST BE MORE THAN THIS shares her methods, along with real-life, inspirational stories of success.

Wright contends that we all have an innate desire to lead emotionally fulfilling lives, but too often we are tripped up by our dependence on seemingly harmless habits — shopping, watching TV, gossiping, surfing the net- routines that can insulate us from our thoughts, feelings, and from other people. These seemingly harmless habits are "soft addictions," and they form a powerful net that traps us, preventing us from living more consciously or fully.

The term Soft Addictions was coined by Judith and the Wright Institute as a way of designating those habits and behaviors that keep us from our feelings. Soft addictions satisfy surface desires or urges and ignore deeper needs. They numb us from our feelings and help us avoid our anxieties, substituting a superficial high or sense of activity for a sense of genuine purpose and fulfillment. In a very real sense, we become hooked on these habitual behaviors. But unlike drugs or alcohol, our soft addictions arrive in the guise of a "normal" socially acceptable activity.

Examples of Soft Addictions include:

THERE MUST BE MORE THAN THIS addresses the hunger that we have for more in life for more love, enjoyment, fulfillment and satisfaction, direction, sense of purpose, and connection with spirit. Wright shows us how, when we live a life of More, we overcome our soft addictions and don¹t feel deprived because our needs are met so fully in other ways. We meet our needs and find fulfillment by engaging in activities and relationships that nurture, refresh, recreate and bring us into deep contact with ourselves. The outcome is more life, love, and meaning.

The first step in Wright's program is to admit that you are engaged in activities that create a barrier to a more fulfilling and juicier life and, then, make the "One Decision" to change things. It is a gradual process of replacing numbing behaviors with nurturing activities. The promise is a life of More in which each day advances your goals and your vision, in which you live more purposefully and feel more intensely, in which you stop asking the small questions and start asking the big ones, in which your days are structured around meaningful activities, and your soft addictions fall away.

Judith Wright, educator, trainer, and seminar leader, co-founded the Wright Institute for Lifelong Learning after 20 years of developing innovative, inspirational personal growth programs for universities, corporations, and individuals. She has taught workshops on overcoming soft addictions and creating MORE for thirteen years. Judith's work has been covered widely in the media including Good Morning America, the San Francisco Chronicle, and more. She is a frequent speaker for events like the Whole Life Expo and groups like the Association of Humanistic Psychology, the Junior League, and the National Association of Women Business Leaders, and for corporations such as Bank One and AC Nielsen.

THERE MUST BE MORE THAN THIS / Judith Wright
Broadway Books / April 1, 2003 / $23.00 / ISBN: 0-7679-1339-6