I know, I’m hopelessly unreliable at writing regularly here, but although I regret that, I have to admit there are a few good reasons…
1/ Most of my time is taken up with home educating – at GCSE level this is particularly intense.
2/ I’m trying to use my spare time to get book no 3 written.
3/ Any blogging I do is usually on my other, older ‘In the Secret Place’ blog about the stuff that God and I chat about (but even that hasn’t had much content lately).
So this little blog about my writing antics does often feel sadly neglected. HOWEVER that does not mean there’s nothing going on… it just means I have to get my priorities in order and accept that it’s not always possible or even right to do everything a ‘proper writer’ is supposed to. I was reminded of that very recently…
You see, after The Jesse Tree Anthology was published last September, throughout October and November I did my best to embrace the realm of marketing. I felt a duty to promote the hard work of all the amazing writers who contributed, but there was also an element of “this is what you have to do as a writer”. So almost every day I created new graphics and plastered Instagram with them, wringing all I could out of every single hashtag. I quite like the creative part – it can be fun – but the pressure to keep it up was intolerable, and by December I was exhausted: I simply couldn’t manage another one. I figured most people who wanted an Advent study would have bought it by then, and with that reasoning I came to a crashing halt. A totally broken full-stop. Not ideal, but that’s where I was.
After about a month of much-needed rest with family over Christmas and the New Year, I reflected on how soul-destroying it had come to feel, and I realised that in taking advice about successful writing, promoting & marketing, some of it had become more of a burden than a help. It’s not that it was bad advice, just that I had let it take precedence over my own needs, stealing my peace – never a good idea. So I prayed and asked God for his advice, and as part of that conversation with God He reminded me why I had started writing in the first place: to make Him known. I remembered the freedom I had felt in choosing self-publication over the world’s ideals, and the joy I had found in writing for the Kingdom rather than the pressure of trying to be a “professionally successful writer”. And I resolved – again – to only follow writerly advice IF it lined up with what I felt God had asked me to. I have peace again. Thank You, God.
But not only that – I now also have support…
I have joined a group called “Kingdom Story Writers”. The group was formed out of the amazing retreat that I went on last year, where I first felt that freedom to write for God’s Kingdom rather than for “success” by any other terms. Since then I have stayed in touch with the leaders and some of the other writers there, and am delighted to have been invited to be part of a group established specifically to encourage other writers with the same Kingdom-priority in writing. It’s early days, but we’re establishing a website, a Facebook Group, a regular podcast, and… another retreat – hooray! All for the purpose of encouraging and helping other Kingdom writers, whether they write fiction, memoir, devotionals or other works that are all part of God’s great story. Keep an eye out for the link here on my website in case you’d like a look!
And meanwhile, I hope that whatever your passion or calling from God, you never become overwhelmed in it with worldly advice or ‘shoulds’, but that You know His leading and have His peace in all that you do! Amen x
Rachel Yarworth, Writer 