The Mystery of Grace

I do not at all understand the mystery of grace - only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it founds us ~ Anne Lamott

I like this quote so much today, I'm going to leave it at that.  I hope your dream journey is providing you all the grace you deserve in life.

Burst Apart, Spring Forth

It is alone, truly alone, that one burst apart, springs forth ~ Maria Isabel Barreno

No matter how many "buddies" you find along your dream journey or how many other people have gone before you, your dream journey really is up to you.

I am the first one that will tell you to find a buddy to help you along your dream, but it is also important to understand that your dream is yours and your alone.  Only you can stick to the routines you develop.  Only you can create the timelines to make your goals work for you.  When it all comes down to it, only you can be responsible for your own dreams coming true.

What is task on your dream journey that you prefer to do alone?

What Might Never Have Been Seen

Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen ~ Robert Bresson

No matter what your dream journey, you can always make visible what may have been missed by others.  It's inevitable.  No matter how many people made the journey before you, yours will always be a unique story.

If you've had the weekend off or taken the weekend off, I hope you're enjoying it.  This has been the first four day weekend I've had off probably since March and I am so enjoying it.

What mark are you making within your dream journey tribe?

Happy Thanksgiving!

All we have is all we need.  All we need is the awareness of how blessed we really are ~ Sara Ban Breathnach

It's Thanksgiving Day in the U.S.  Happy Thanksgiving!  I hope this day brings you joy, however you celebrate, what ever you do.

I feel really blessed this year to have my writing on track where it needs to be, to have a job that absolutely enjoy.  I have a schedule that allows me the time in the morning to work on my writing when I am at my best and I have bosses that allow me the time off on Friday so I can enjoy a nice long weekend.

Whether it's Thanksgiving or not where you are, what are you thankful for this year?

A Calm White Page

[Writing is] being able to take something whole and fiercely alive that exists inside you in some unknowable combination of thought, feeling, physicality, and spirit, and to then store it like a genie in tense, tiny black symbols on a calm white page ~ Mary Gaitskill

Being a dreamer is also like taking your thoughts, feelings, physicality, and spirit and storing it in your work.

There are about six weeks left of the year.  For some, you've met your goals and you can glide through the holidays pretty easily.  For others, Thanksgiving is the time that the busy season begins through the end of the year.

Whatever the season brings for you, I hope you make the most of it.  If there is still time for you to meet your goals, I wish you the best of the luck.  I feel very fortunate and humble to have exceeded my goals for 2012.  I finished my first novel, A Place to Call Their Own.  After some editing and feedback I am ready to send it to an editor. 

But I exceeded even my own expectations by completing the first draft of a second novel, Disappear With Me.  I am ready to start my own round of self editing and then it should be ready for submissions or self publication next year as well. 

I haven't figured out my goals exactly for 2013, you'll have to keep in tune.  I am very happy with what I've accomplished this year.

Did your 2012 go as planned?

Whispers

I bet you thought I forgot about you today?  Not at all, I just had an announcement I wanted to make and reflect upon, but had to wait until today to write about it.

I was nominated and elected to my church's Board of Elders this morning at church.  I am honored and humbled to have been nominated in the first place, let alone elected to serve a term of three years on the church's governing board.

Earlier this week, I saw a slide show on Oprah's website that was a list of opportunities you should never turn down.  The list includes things such as a godchild's plea, garlic, an invitation to Sunday dinner.  When I was notified that my name was nominated by the committee at church, I had an overwhelming feeling that I needed to accept this nomination. 

This feeling is very much like my journey as a writer.  I feel very much that same:  that is a calling which I must answer.  Your dream journey should call to you just the same.  I believe Oprah calls it a whisper. 

What whisper have you  heard in your life lately?

Start From Scratch

No matter how long you've been at it, you always start from scratch ~ Jeffrey Eugenides

You always start from scratch.  Each time I get a new idea for another novel, I always start from scratch.  When I was in direct sales, we started from scratch on each new promotion. 

So this quote has two lessons.  The first lesson, is even if you're just starting and it feels like you are plowing new ground, remember, even people who have been doing what you're trying to accomplish start from scratch.  The second lesson I garnered from this quote is that even after you've accomplished a goal (i.e. writing one novel), you always start from scratch on the next step or the next repeat of your goal (i.e., writing a second novel).

After you reach a goal, do you feel like you always start from scratch?