Looking for encouragement to keep going as a writer? Here’s a story of patience, perseverance, and providence (a.k.a. “chugging away” in the writing life and being surprised by God):
I shared this story in a few writing groups on social media and the writers there seemed to find it encouraging, so I decided to share it here as well in hopes that it encourages you to keep going!
Back in October 2015, just after I signed my first traditional book contract for a memoir called A Place to Land, I pitched a different book at a writing conference to an acquisitions editor at a big Christian publisher.
He said he really liked my idea and my writing and thought it would make a great gift book, but at the time, the publisher he was working for wasn’t accepting gift books.
So, I self-published the book and carried on with my life, writing other things, supporting writers, making connections, offering what I could with the gifts I’d been given.
Fast forward to January 2022 (more than six years after pitching at that conference), the same guy I pitched to sent me an email and said, “Hey, I don’t know if you remember, but you pitched a book to me back at this conference and I couldn’t do anything with it at the time, but now I just became Vice President of this other publishing company and I have a little more sway, and I wondered if we could buy your book?”
Umm . . . yes?!
“Oh, and while we’re talking, I wondered if you would write another book for us . . . .”
Umm . . . sure!
That was exactly two years ago, and today I’m thrilled to announce the release of those two books:
(originally self-published but now revamped)
LEARN MORE HERE
. . . The moral of the story is:
Don’t stop! Keep going!
Keep doing the next thing that the Lord sets in front of you, don’t get stuck on what’s not working in that moment, just knock on the doors and move on if they don’t open.
Be faithful to use the gifts you’ve been given and practice contentment (preaching to myself here!) with whatever the Lord lays in your path.
It may take seven days or seven weeks or seven years (or not happen at all!), but your job is to be able to say you were faithful with the talents you were given, and leave the outcome up to God.
Cheering for you today!
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I am incredibly proud of you, Kate, and I am speaking for your mom, too. I know she is observing from heaven and celebrating the person who has been faithful to her calling in all aspects of life.
Aww, thank you, Jane! You are so sweet. I appreciate your kindness and thoughtfulness.