Category: Writing

8/7/2014

When writing loves you back

Next month marks 3 years since the start of this Blog. It has been quite a journey! Looking back over early posts, I came across one, written two months after I began writing regularly. It marks 30 days of blogging and posting every day. I still can't believe I did that. I think I kept that pace up for about a year.

Some of you have been with me since the beginning. Others are coming later to the game. While my writing voice has continued to develop and the messaging has become more focused, the spirit of the blog - captured in this post - is still very much the same. So for "Throwback Thursday", I am bringing this post up to today's date (and polishing it up a bit) for your reading pleasure.

Last Friday marked thirty consecutive days of blog posts. Now, for most bloggers, that would be considered - ho hum - normal. But for me?

My best writing streak ever was in 1998. I wrote seven consecutive articles over a two or three day period. Afterward, I put my pen down and relaxed, writing one or two things a year, because I considered such abundant writing an exceptional phenomenon. But when I recently realized how many hungry little fishes surface in the internet pond every single day looking for inspiring, hopeful content to help them on their daily swim, I was impelled to jump into the deep end of blogging despite my personal doubts.

I love to write. I love to explore an idea from many angles and to tell a memorable story. (I am full of stories!) I especially love to share the good news of what God is and does. Anything that helps others to feel the power and love of God that is right there in their midst is a thrill to me. But the commitment to blog - to think deeply and share new content consistently every day - well, I wasn't sure I could keep up.

Then I read this tip from a fellow blogger, Brian Wood: "Quality is better than quantity, but quantities of quality wins." I think his words speak to the unlimited potential to be inspired and to share quality ideas. I believe that everyone has infinite quantities of love in their hearts. As Christ Jesus said, "A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things..." (Matthew 12:35)

Every blog post is a love letter. Love for God, love for the message, love for the stories and love for the reader - it all comes together in each post. Its funny though, in the midst of all that love, I forgot that I, too, would be on the receiving end!

People have asked how I can blog everyday and get everything else done. The fact is that, since I started blogging - which is a time and attention commitment - my activities have become streamlined and the time-wasters have disappeared. It is like daily life has yielded all its little hidden moments over to the writing, and other tasks now unfold without a hitch. Mary Baker Eddy explained this phenomenon in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures. "Working and praying with true motives, your Father will open the way." (p. 326)

Example: I am involved in emptying and selling our family home. I have a short window to accomplish it. I am also working full-time and keeping up with the blog. There has been a lot to coordinate, and yet there hasn't been a second of delay in getting things done. Painters, carpenters, electricians and plumbers have all come, and completed their work well, within a day of my request. Not one has kept me waiting or scheduled things for weeks later.

Another example: Last week I went to the French Consulate in New York to notarize some legal papers. Nothing I have done with the Consulate has ever taken less than a week and at least two trips to the city. It was done in 15 minutes.

I attribute this flow of good in my daily tasks to the commitment to writing with love - and about what I love - daily. Eddy once said in one of her poems that God, divine Love "makes radiant room midst the glories of one endless day." (Poems, p.75)

I love to blog for you. And the blog is loving me right back!

This post was originally published on this blog on November 21, 2011.

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4/4/2012

Tip for writers - Getting published

I became a writer in 1993. Well, actually, that is a lie. I became a published writer, with my first article appearing in a magazine, in 1993. I started writing years before. I just kind of stunk at it for a long while.

The evolution from writing to getting published involved a single-minded focus on my message, finding my voice, loving the reader enough to write in an understandable way, persisting, and a lot of getting over myself.

And not necessarily in that order.

Finding my subject and focus was never a problem. I wrote about what I loved - healing prayer. But sending in my first manuscript was a bit like sending a picture of my kid to the "Most Beautiful Baby" contest. I couldn't believe others didn't see it the way I did!

To sum up the politely written form letter that came back, in the fewest possible words, it read: No way, José.

So I did what any self-respecting writer, who was thrilled by the sound of her own writing voice, would do. I tweaked and snipped and primped and plumped the article, changed the title, and sent it in again. This time the response was more personalized: No way, José. And don't think you are fooling us. We know it is the same piece.

Well, I thought, at least they remember me!

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When writing loves you back

Tip for writers - Getting published

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YOUR CART

When writing loves you back

Tip for writers - Getting published

Find me on YouTube​

Archives

Categories

INFORMATION

SERVICES

HELP

Find me on YouTube