What do you dream? —Carolyn R. Wilker

What did you dream as a child, as a youth, or as a young adult? Has that dream come true, or is it still on the way?

Today I began to read Exit Stage Right by fellow writer Jennifer Willcock. In it a student dreaming of a career in ballet goes for an audition at a prestigious school, despite anxiety whether she will be accepted. [No spoilers]

I thought about the fictional girl and how we follow our own dreams.

From the time I was a small girl, I’d wanted to be a teacher. My dreams may have come about because of a Sunday School teacher, as I learned new songs and heard new stories. Or it may have been inspired by my first teacher in my elementary school. Whatever it was, I saved my Sunday School papers and told my mother that I would need them because one day I would be a teacher.

  

Mom gave me a set of loose leaf rings to keep the Sunday School papers together. I believe I would also have kept my school notebooks indefinitely, as well, if I had been allowed to. The Sunday School story pages eventually disappeared and my school notebooks made their way to the attic of our farm house, to yellow with heat and age, and one day be tossed, but I was fiercely attached to my goal.

After confirmation at age 14, I eagerly accepted the challenge of teaching Sunday School, planning each lesson and teaching the students entrusted to me. I taught children of varying ages, and at summer camp too. It was as if my site-glass was permanently set on that goal.

Me with one of my Sunday School classes and fellow teacher

During my Grade 12 year at high school, I applied to college in the Early Childhood Education program and was accepted. I achieved my dream, teaching for several years—in co-op preschool, a city daycare centre—and then my own children as they came along. Eventually I made my way back to co-op preschool with my daughters, assisting the teacher and filling in when she couldn’t be there.

In time, I began to write, then began to teach again—adults this time—and curiously also to take up Toastmasters and storytelling, and writing stories for others, including children. My goal shifted, but I was still teaching and helping others learn.

 

Storyteller at Enabling Gardens in Guelph

Through it all, there has been one guiding principle—my faith in someone greater than I am. A force that has been with me since childhood, something I continue to learn about. In spite of this current time with the Covid-19 pandemic, no matter my emotions at the moment or my goals for another book, I know that Jesus walks with me each day. I can count on him.

Your dreams can take on different shapes as mine did. They can take you on adventures you never dreamed possible. Who walks with you and guides you in your dreams? I hope you found a guide with a reliable compass.

https://www.carolynwilker.ca/

Carolyn R. Wilker is an Ontario-based writer, editor and storyteller

Thankfulness Checklist by Steph Beth Nickel

We've been encouraged in recent years to keep a gratitude journal. Ann Voskamp encourages readers to make a list of 1,000 things they're thankful for. (Not to worry; this list will be much shorter than that.)

As writers, our list will include items most others wouldn't even think to add. Below are five of the things I'm thankful for and examples of each.

Total Strangers

When someone you've never met connects with you and tells you they appreciate your programs on HopeStreamRadio, it's humbling and encouraging.

Total strangers don't stay strangers long when you connect over a common pursuit such as writing. I met Ron Hughes at Write Canada a number of years ago. So when he called to see if I knew anyone who would be interested in joining the HopeStreamRadio team, I was eager to get on board.

Online Communities

Yes, there are downsides to the Internet. We can spend hours commenting on status updates, tweeting, and pinning that would be better spent writing, reading, or doing housework. We can dive down one rabbit hole after the next after the next.

On the other hand, we can connect with amazing people we're never likely to meet in person who will encourage, challenge, and enlighten us. Such is the case with communities such as the Create If Writing group on Facebook. I've linked to the public group, but there are several advantages to joining the paid community as well. 

And I have to tell you the online communities that I've connected with are made up of some of the most generous people you'll ever meet.

Podcasts

I could list podcast after podcast after podcast where I like to hang out. While I enjoy reading, I've found that a familiar voice soon becomes a trusted voice, especially when the information they're sharing is practical and up-to-date.

Among the podcasts I follow are Kirsten Oliphant's Create If Writing, Joanna Penn's The Creative Penn, and Tara Hunt's Truly Social.

Challenges

I have joined the thousands of other writers who are participating in National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo. I'm on track to hit the 25K mark today. The challenge, if you're not familiar with it, is to write 50K words in the month of November. Obviously, the idea is to write the first draft of a novel. However, there are those who use the energy and camaraderie to write short stories, academic papers, etc. I love it and am learning a lot. As was said, there are no NaNo police.

Lifetime Access

If any of you have attended a free online summit, you'll know the allure of purchasing lifetime access. You can listen to the interviews whenever you want to, whenever you have the time. You have the luxury of going back and listening over and over to those you found particularly helpful.

I have purchased lifetime access to many summits and have signed up for the paid courses after watching brief series of free lessons on writing and writing-related topics.

These are all well and good, but I have to go back and start digging into the wealth of material I have access to. It does me know good tucked away in cyber space.

What's on your Thankfulness Checklist? 

An Enriched Life by Ruth Smith Meyer

After almost a year’s pause in opportunities for such, I had two opportunities for speaking engagements in two weeks.   Since the past year has been one of adjustment after the death of my second husband, I wondered how it would go. I needn’t have worried.  It felt good to be once more sharing from my growth.

This also gave me opportunity to pause and reflect on the changes writing has brought to my life in the last fifteen years. Writing in a more intentional way was a dream I had from childhood.  After the death of my first husband, I began with an assignment for a week’s worth of devotions for the REJOICE! magazine.  When I had good response from those, I ventured out with a few magazine articles then with a burst of courage, began working on a novel that had been percolating for a few years. 

That was an entirely new undertaking.  I will always be grateful for the help and coaching I got through several avenues—The Word Guild, WRITE conferences and Ray and Anna Wiseman. The writing was a joy.  Even the editing and rewriting and rewriting I found rewarding.  The folks at Word Alive were very helpful in the process.  I was happy for the relationships built in during that time.  

I wasn’t young any more, but I was a newbie where publication and selling of books was concerned. I was nervous, awed and elated when the first shipment of Not Easily Broken actually arrived on my doorstep.   As many writers, I enjoy writing more than selling, but it is part of who a writer has to be.  I began with a book launch, then took opportunities at bazaars, church and public events where I could display my book and sell some. 

Much to my surprise, my writing also was the means of fulfilling another childhood dream—

one I thought to be unattainable. That dream was to be an inspirational speaker. In the church of my childhood, women speaking in public was not a possibility.  However, people began asking if I would come and speak about some issues in my book and then make the book available to those in attendance.

Not Far from the Tree, a sequel to my first book, was published a few years later, then Tyson’s Sad Bad Day.   The latter was another new experience, for it branched into children’s literature and stretched my horizons as I toiled over illustrating the story. Each book its own way, continued to urge me to keep growing. Yes, growth can be painful, but it is also most satisfying.  

Being involved in the Hot Apple Cider anthologies, was also a growing experience. My Ready Writers group in London had already helped me appreciate good editing and those series did more of the same.  NJ Lindquist and Wendy Nelles encouraged me to keep tweeking my contributions until they were all they could be.  It makes me proud to be part of these books. 

Out of the Ordinary was another new experience.  My own life happenings, first meant for only family, then shared with the larger public, opened a whole other level of connection.  At first I felt quite vulnerable, but soon found a depth and richness to the relationship I developed with my readers. 

It was through writing and being a part of our Ready Writers Writer’s Group and the Hot Apple Cider Series that I met Ruth Coghill and had the opportunity to be on her radio program. 

Good Grief People, too has touched my own heart and those of readers in a different way than the other books. Again, my world has been enlarged and I give thanks. 

Every time a speaking opportunity comes along, I meet more individuals and get to hear their stories as well. And that’s where the third dream of my childhood is fulfilled—meeting a lot of people, getting to know them, understand them and to hear how their lives were lived. I do love people! ☺

Finding out that readers identify with the characters in my stories or with the tales of my childhood provides an instant connection. It makes me feel close to them. To hear that my writing has encouraged readers to reach for their best, to have the courage to share their growth, or to face some challenge is such a thrilling reward.  

Writing certainly has enriched my life. As long as God gives me the ability to do so, I shall continue. If I can encourage some others to write, the benefits will go on. 

Wisdom from William Shakespeare--Carolyn R. Wilker

In his time, William Shakespeare, poet and playright, knew a thing or two about the stage, but his work covered many areas of life. Biography.com says “over the course of 20 years, Shakespeare wrote plays that capture the complete range of human emotion and conflict.”

Besides his plays, poems and sonnets, other official documentation of his life come from church and court records. Of his education, there is little information, leaving historians to surmise where he attended school, and others to doubt how he could write so prolifically and so well. There were other historians who supposed his works to be the product of other men. Yet the grammar schools at the time taught about the arts, so he may have had a good educational base. Sources that affirmed his work included the Queen’s court where Shakespeare and his fellows performed.

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts

His acts being seven ages.

By the late 1590s Shakespeare was selling his plays, though selling his plays and acting didn’t comprise the main part of his income. James Shapiro wrote in his book, The Year of Lear: Shakespeare in 1606, that Shakespeare collaborated with others early in his career, and on five of his last ten plays.

Unlike plays now that are repeated night after night for a period of time, Shapiro said in his online video at the site, that Shakespeare’s patrons expected a new play every day. Shapiro calls the schedule an exhausting one. Shakespeare read and wrote late into the night, all without the benefit of caffeine or tea, neither of which had been introduced to England at the time. He and his men would rehearse the next morning, then they would present the new play later that day.

 The biography states further: “What seems to be true is that William Shakespeare was a respected man of the dramatic arts who wrote plays and acted in some in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. But his reputation as a dramatic genius wasn't recognized until the 19th century.”

Shakespeare would have known grief too, as everyone does at some time or other of life. One of his children, a son, died at age 11. The biography at this site only states the fact. Perhaps this was the time he wrote: “Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o’er-fraught heart and bids it break.”

This particular biography doesn’t deal with his faith, but it shows that he was baptized, returned home from London during the 40 days of Lent when the theatre was closed, and that he was buried at the church and his death recorded there. Perhaps another biography would tell more.

What can writers today learn from Shakespeare? Probably about his persistence. He kept at it, working at other jobs, staying close to the theatre scene, learning and continuing to write until he’d written enough that people took him seriously.

If God puts it on your heart to write, then keep on writing. Though you have family and another job to pay bills, find a way to get your words written. Submit your work and follow through. And may your words bless others.

Learning Discipline through Blogging

“Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.” (1 Peter 4:10)

Today’s topic is the title of a devotion written by Melony Teague.  It is one of ninety devotions in As the Ink Flows: Devotions to Inspire Christian Writers & Speakers. The writing prompt asks: “Do you blog? If not, consider creating a blog as a form of self-discipline in your writing life. If you do already have a blog, how can you better use it as a tool to establish the habit of writing daily?”

Mel’s prompt encouraged me, and fellow author Claudia Loopstra, to jot down the benefits of consistent blogging.

We came up with seventeen; can you help us reach twenty?

A blog can:

1.       Honour God

2.       Be a forerunner to a book

3.       Provide personal accountability

4.       Stretch our minds and spirit daily/ weekly

5.       Share our spiritual gifts

6.       Be a witness to others

7.       Hone our writing skills and vocabulary

8.       Improve our ability to write concisely (300-500 words for a topic)

9.       Market our published works

10.   Create a ‘brand’ for our writing

11.   Highlight other authors and their  published works

12.   Share information

13.   Encourage  others to start the habit

14.   Provide conversation starters and comments

15.   Develop our ‘voice’

16.   Build relationships

17.   Become a published article

A Prompt to Write by Carol Ford

I volunteered to a write blog for The Word Guild site on the 22^nd of each month, and February’s theme “love” was idling in the back of my mind, but I was having trouble moving forward with the piece.  Then I remembered our writers’ group had written a devotional specifically for this purpose. How could I have forgotten this source? Do you sometimes forget to apply the very ideas you have put in writing to inspire others?

I leafed through our book As the Ink Flows: Devotions to Inspire Writers & Speakers and found the devotion entitled “Writing with Love,” written by Glenda Dekkema. Here was the prompt I needed. Glenda had written out 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 and replaced the word “love” with the word “writing”.
"Writing is patient, writing is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Writing does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

At the end of this devotion, Glenda asks the reader to reflect on the words of Mother Teresa, “I’m a little pencil in the hand of a writing God, who is sending a love letter to the world.”

She also prompted the reader to write a love letter to the world, the army, a victim, or my nemesis.

This gave me an idea for today's blog. I chose to write a letter to a victim.

Dear victim of war,

Nightly, when I view the news, I see the violent and shocking ways your life is being destroyed and abused in the turmoil of war.  My heart aches for the misery and sadness I see in your eyes, especially in the eyes of your children. I watch your desperate flight from enemy fire, the bleeding injuries to your loved ones as they lay in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions, the mud and snow you have to trample through to carry out your daily chores, and the temporary shelters that make up your home. I cannot comprehend the depth of anguish and pain you must be feeling, but I want you to know, that with every meal I eat, or when I crawl into a warm bed, or observe wet and cold weather from my dry and comfortable home, I’m acutely aware of the contrasts and of God’s blessings in my own life. I feel guilty. I ask God, “Why am I safe and sound when so many others are suffering in the world?”

I feel helpless to right these injustices being inflicted on you, and, although I pray, give money to missions and look for opportunities to help those in my own community, it never seems to be enough.

I wanted to write this letter to tell you that you are not forgotten and that God loves you, and he knows all about your trials.  He really cares and so do I. The following scripture might be of some comfort to you. These words are from The Holy Bible, words believed by followers of Christ around the world. “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38-39 New International Versions (NIV)

As I close this letter, be assured that many of us continue to pray for peace and restoration in your country.

In Christian Love, Carol

Carol Ford is a co-author of As the Ink Flows: Devotions to Inspire Christian Writers & Speakers and has a short story in Hot Apple Cider with Cinnamon. She is a career coach and speaker. 
https://carolfordassociates.wordpress.com/

https://www.facebook.com/As-the-Ink-Flows-Devotions-to-Inspire-Christian-Writers-Speakers-831092453662406/?ref=aymt_homepage_panel

Love is in the Air ... and in the Vacuum of Cyberspace by Steph Beth Nickel

First, I must say, “Thank you, Glynis, for the invitation to post regularly to TWG blog.” Guest blogging is, indeed, something I love to do, thus, the title of today’s post.

Guest posting … there are conflicting ideas about the wisdom of inviting others to post on your blog. After all, don’t readers pop by to read what you, the blog owner, have to say?

That certainly may be true if you are the author of several books with a following of thousands or tens of thousands. However, many (most) of us are not at that point.

Plus, some blogs, like this one, are set up with the intention of having a number of different contributors.

Here are six things I love about guest posting:

1. I don’t have to come up with a topic. Sometimes my eclectic interests make it a challenge for me to zero in on my target audience and what I should write about for my own blog and website.

2. People I wouldn’t reach otherwise read my words—and hopefully, are encouraged.

3. By writing for others and seeing how they lay out their site, I get ideas for my own online presence.

4. I am becoming increasingly adept at using sites such as pixabay[dot]com and picmonkey[dot]com to create graphics to include with my posts.

5. As is the case for many writers, a looming deadline serves as a great motivator.

6. As a result of guest posting, I have developed friendships with those for whom I blog and others.

And six things I love about inviting others to guest post on my blog:

1. It provides encouragement to other writers who do not have their own blog.

2. It validates those who question the relevance and worth of their words.

3. It gives timid writers the opportunity to connect with an “audience.”

4. It gives these writers the opportunity to encourage my readers.

5. It gives my readers the opportunity to read something unique, something with a different voice.

6. When I was blogging regularly, it gave me a break.

So, to my fellow TWG members—and others—who welcome me to their blogs regularly, “Thank you! The vacuum of cyberspace is anything but dark and dreary because of you.”

If you have a blog, do you invite others to guest post? Regularly? Every now and then?

Do you guest post for others? What do you love about doing so?