Since my last post I’ve been through the gamut emotionally but am now moving in a healthy direction. I am practically content for the first time in months. I am involved in a small group, helping my fellowship with overseas work, am looking at a week in the Philippians to help build a fellowship and I’m days away from the writing conference. This state has allowed for me to more clearly see areas I need to change in, such as finances, and to more adequately take steps to grow in these areas.
None of this to say my life has become perfect, but I am content where I am and with what I am doing. I am listening to the Father’s guidance for growth (one thing at a time). And I’m not dancing on the edge of depression right now.
Maybe it’s the seasons, maybe it’s the help I’ve had recently or maybe it’s a change of mind set which has made me feel that the Father is close to me. I’ve known it in my head all along, but I’ve really struggled to feel it for the last year and a half. I held to the knowledge that He would never leave me nor forsake me, that He wouldn’t be done with me until He took me, but the knowledge couldn’t creep into my wayward feelings until now.
Now one of my greatest struggles is my writing. I keep writing but the words have been falling flat, lifeless. I think I really need to sit down and focus on each scene, the depth of emotion in them and allow myself to feel them. I have been learning how to leave crazy emotions behind better and I guess writing is a good exercise for that. A little scary though when you’re writing a scene where the character literally faces death – and then dies. Or another with a child so lonely they run from anyone who speaks to him. So much pain, fear… scary emotions in my opinion, but necessary in writing and common in life.
I’m hoping the conference this week will help me breathe life back into my scenes and my pen and continue to help me refine my craft as well as my focus. Let my eyes be on the one who is always with me, who’s hand covers mine and who’s breath fills my soul. Now to just get the breath onto the page.
There is a song, "The More I Seek You" which I have fallen in love with, but there is a line in the song about the cup in the hand of the Lord. The song states "I want to drink from the cup in Your hand." I wonder how many of us really want to drink of this cup, though. Below are my reflections on this one line. A line that has torn at my heart and made me recognize my doubts and fear.
The cup in the hand of the Lord – we do not know its contents, but He asks us to drink. To drink deep with Him no matter. The contents of the cup are intense, overwhelming – beautiful and heart breaking. Each cup is filled to overflowing with:
Sacrifice AND blessing
Loneliness AND love
Pain AND Obedience (peace)
Sorrow AND trust
Passion AND Patience
Each cup is mixed with great hardship and rich blessings. Can we have one without the other? I do not think so. But, on our own, we cannot bear the intensity of any cup. That is why He ask us to drink with Him, not alone. He is strong enough.
I tremble at His feet and stare at the cup.
“What is in it?” I ask.
“Drink with Me.”
“Will it hurt?”
“Drink with Me.”
“I’m frightened. The cup will change me, won’t it?”
He nods.
“It will be too much, more than I can handle.”
He nods.
“I cannot. It will kill me.”
“You can,” He says. “And as you drink, I will hold you closer. Your heart will beat against Mine. Your tears will mix with Mine. Your pain will be Mine. Your death, also My death. Your blessings, My glory. Your trust, My peace. Your patience, My joy. Drink with Me.”
Tears slide down my face. “I am so afraid.”
“Then let me be your courage.”
I turn my eyes from the cup and seek His gaze. Tears shimmer within them. He reaches to me and pulls me to His chest. He kisses my forehead and I feel a tear follow the tender touch of His lips. “Drink with Me.”
The cup is raised.
Still I shake, but I nod my head.
He places the cup to His lips first.
Sorrow tears at my heart as He shudders, His face drawn in pain.
Then the cup is before me. I place my weak, trembling hands over His and close my eyes. Cold metal touches my lips and I drink.
I spend so much time trying to DO something for God. To be important to him by my actions, to be needed and used and, dare I say it, special. But the more I do the less content I am.
I hear again and again how we must learn to rest in him, to patiently wait on Him, to trust Him. And I try, I really do. But I am failing quite miserably at it.
The last year I have felt useless. What am I doing to serve Him? to bring glory to His name? Nothing great. Nothing big. Just little things. I want to do more than the little things. (I don't sound like a spoiled little child, do I?)
If he cannot trust me with the little things why should I ever be worthy of doing "great" things? If I never sit down to listen to Him, open His word, talk with Him and just dwell on the awesomeness of God, can I ever truly bring glory to His name?
I doubt it. I might be able to work myself up into appearing important to other people, but I will never actually be "special". It would be a mirage that quickly vanishes. I want to be more than a mirage but I can't be.
Every breath brings me closer to the moment I vanish in the breeze. Every breath is a chance to change, to learn, to trust. Trust.
It is trust which will bring glory to God. I trust Him for my bread, my breath, my bills, my dreams, my purpose, even with my impatience and nagging questions. I will only learn to trust Him more by spending time with Him, by slowing my day and my mind and taking a few minutes or more and listening.
Reflecting.
Loving.
And then I realize. I will still never actually be special, because who can be compared to Him? And that's okay. He is special and perfect. He is life, Creator, King, Friend and my very heartbeat - and He loves me. Maybe I am a little special to be loved by one so great.
But then, we all are.
Check out the new free verse I posted in Perspectives.
Well it's been awhile, not surprising. Someday I might actually learn discipline, but I'm not holding my breath.
I've continued working on my two projects and am even brain storming a third. This is great for a writing career, but I feel it is evidence of a dissatisfied mind as well. Things I love have been felling burdensome and my energy level just never comes back (though being pretty sick twice since I last wrote does give a bit of an excuse). I just can't seem to accomplish anything anymore and this has led to a deep discontentment with my life right now.
Now this doesn't mean I'm depressed or crying myself to sleep every night, it means I'm restless and unfocused. I still like my job, my home, my long weekends, the increase of sunny days (though it's brought an excess of pollen with it), and my lazy cat. What specifically is leaving me discontent? The sense there should be something more, that I should be doing something more.
Obviously I battle the Martha complex, add to that three years of seeing a purpose in front of me everyday (even if I didn't think I was doing well) and I'm feeling kinda stuck and just questioning things. Is writing really going to be worthy it? Yes I love delving into new worlds, languages, and minds and discovering the intense stories built in each of these. Yes I dream of being in print and getting my stories into the hands of avid readers longing for tales of magic and quests ingrained with Christian values. But will I ever be good enough to actually accomplish this? Will I ever have the discipline and finances to really see it through? Will I give up?
Part of me wants to scream NO, but another part of me, the overly practical, list making part sees all the ways I'm not cut out for this lifestyle which leaves me wondering. Did I mis-hear God? Is writing my passion and dream, but not what He has in mind for me? Or am I letting the enemy rob the joy of a godly passion?
Despite my doubts and nagging dissatisfaction, I am not quitting. I continue to write and to edit in between recovering from a new illness that strikes every few weeks (and never the swine flu so stop worrying) and the gradual increase of activities as the weather warms. I continue to re-read writing texts and think how to improve and laying my trepidations at the cross where they belong. Add to all that and I'm attending my first writer's conference this next week. It's real close, Estes Park, and Christian. I'm hoping this conference will provide the knowledge I need to go forward at this point, a few contacts, but especially a confirmation that I'm on the right course. This doesn't mean an agent falls in love with my idea or a publisher eagerly requests a full manuscript. This would just be a sense of comfort, an increase of passion, and an overall contentment in the environment of Christian writers and with my own writing (as desperate as it is for a professional editor).
My editor money is going to this conference so it probably won't be until the end of summer until I can get Isaiah sent out for a deep edit. But this could be good as I've been working through a text Self-Editing for Fiction Writers which came highly recommended from several writing sites. Taking my WIP through the steps in this book is slow, time consuming, and sometimes aggravating, but I'm really like the results. A clear story, easier to follow, and cleaner. Now I just need to figure out how to amp up the tension in the middle (yes, I suffer from the dreaded sagging middle), and I think I’ll have all the steps I know how to do so when I send my WIP to an editor she'll be finding things I haven't learned about yet and be able to see glaring plot issues rather than a mountain of amateur mistakes. I hope this will make the editing experience a true learning environment truly preparing me for the vicious publishing world and improved writing in general.
There's so much to learn and so many things I want to improve on, but each day is a struggle with the basics - joy, contentment, and basic self-discipline. My eyes are all around me searching for purpose even as my head and heart tell me, "Look up. In Christ alone is your purpose. Rest and take everything one step at a time. He knows what you need and when you need to learn it. Rest."
So how am I doing balancing two projects. Well, so-so. Tells you a lot, right?
It’s a struggle still. I have broken bits of ideas for what I’m currently writing, my “Talia” project, while I’m also reading editing books and going through my “Isaiah” project piece by piece (not much fun :p). This is making for some interesting crossover. I’ll be looking at how to add sensory details to a scene in my “Isaiah” project and just want to add this brilliant plot twist which would mean re-working the entire manuscript. Probably not a good idea. But then as I’m writing on my “Talia” project I find my critical eye is getting a little worse leaving me dissatisfied with many scenes because of weak description, not enough detail, or poor word choice. This leaves me dreading the actually creation process.
I haven’t given up yet, I’m just still trying to learn how to keep the explosion ideas focused on the “Talia” project and the critical eye focused only on the “Isaiah” project. One of those issues of balance that I’ve never been very good at.
I think my 3-day weekends will be a huge help in finding this balance and actually getting a decent amount of work done on both projects. I would love to have “Isaiah” ready for a professional editor by this summer (if I can save the money for it) knowing it is the best work I have ever done and as solid in all the pivotal areas (characterization, pace, description, dialogue and suspense) as I am currently capable of – but that means a lot more work is ahead of me for this project. I would also love to have the first draft of “Talia” completed at the same time so I can do the first read-through and broad edits (like plot holes, weak characters, and dropped threads).
At this point, though, I have barely 5,000 words on my “Talia” project and with a goal of 70,000 to 80,000 words, I’ve got a ways to go. Also, I’ve only gotten through 8 chapters of “Isaiah” and out of 38, that’s not much of a dent and I think the last two chapters I did I was too tired and probably should do them again. Argh.
But I am not quitting and I will go one step at a time, just like I’ve been learning in my personal life lately. And when I fail to complete a step, I get to try again. The world doesn’t end and my chance at “success” has not passed me by. My choice is to persevere even when I’m discouraged, even when life pulls me away and my body keeps me in bed for 12+ hours a day. I came back to the states to write and it would be pretty sad if I give up just because life hasn’t gone as smoothly as I’d hoped. Guess I’m finding how strong I am, or at least how strong I trust Him who made me.
27year old administrative coordinator for the Communications department of a non-profit in a new state, Colorado. Welcome to my life of eternal transition!
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