I hope you enjoyed Text Me, Maybe. It was a blast writing it, and a blast posting it for you week after week. I have left it up for those who said they would like to read the entire thing at once (something I can identify with), but I will have to take it down if and when I decide to publish it. If you haven’t read it and want to, make sure to do that before it comes down.
Now, onto bigger things. I’ve never been very good at waiting, and truthfully, I don’t think I ever really outgrew the impatience that plagued me as a young adult. I’m a grin-and-bear-it, there’s-no-time-like-the-present kind of gal. Things are often hard, often inconvenient, and the best things usually call for some kind of sacrifice to be made. My life has not been easy and if I had always chosen to wait until I was better or until things were easier, I don’t think I’d be where I am today. But sometimes we come to a place where we don’t have a choice. Or if we do, the consequences of the wrong choice are too great to push through them.
After years of putting it off, of ignoring, of preparing without knowing it, I stepped out in faith and wrote my first manuscript. It was a time of rebirth and new growth, a time of new found freedom. It was exhilarating. After that, I wrote another, this one more intense and challenging than the last. I had found what seemed like a divine passion and calling. The fear that once dominated these things began to buckle under the sheer weight of my joy and fulfillment. And then swiftly, suddenly, like a punch in the gut, the rug was yanked out from underneath me. I felt bereft. After years of abuse and legalism and fear, I had stepped out into glorious sunlight, only to feel like I was being sucked back into the darkness. I cried, I fought, I pounded my fists in frustration. But at the end of the day, I had to trust that this season, too, had its purpose, and that the purpose was so significant that the good Lord saw fit to let me suffer. I don’t know exactly what He is preparing me for, but it must be important enough to put me through this first. That, or He just wants my heart and I am really that stubborn. Maybe it’s both.
It's not that I’m not writing, but indulging the creativity I’ve been gifted has been very difficult during this time. Holding a conversation can be challenging and exhausting; creating one from scratch seems nearly impossible. I’m still trying. Most of the last couple of weeks have been spent recovering from dental surgery, and before that, I was riding out several back-to-back flare-ups from an already poor baseline. During that time, I had so many ideas for the stories in my pipeline, and I made sure to jot them down. I’m thinking and plotting; characters and situations are revealing themselves to me. I’m getting to know some of the people that live in my mind, and I’m exploring their worlds. And when I’m able, I’ll be right back to working on The Contract so I can get this amazing story out to you.
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