Last month I discovered that I tend to focus on the negative instead of the positive. This revelation came to me during one of my son's soccer games, and it hit with all the force of a freight train. After the game he asked if I noticed his assist. I told him that I did, and it was good, but he needed to improve his touches. He shrugged and said, "It figures, you always notice what I don't do." I would have debated the point, but the truth is, he wasn't far off the mark. If he brings home a report card with all A's and one B, I zero in on the lower grade. After giving this a lot of thought, I realized that this negativity also leaks into my writing. As many of you know, I'm a member of some online critique sites. When I first began my novel three years ago, I received a lot of negative feedback on my work. Although it upset me a little, in retrospect, I expected nothing less. After all, I was a fledgling fiction write...