Update: Good News and Hope

Some weeks are good, and some weeks are terrible. Thankfully, this week is proving to be fairly good for me! I recently learned that I am a Shortlist Winner Nominee for three poems I submitted to the 2020 Adelaide Literary Magazine Poetry Contest! I had not even asked anyone to critique them for me before submission, so I am quite amazed! I hope you and your writing endeavors are also going well!

I am also continuing to work on my latest book, with its tentative name of “Portal to Japan.” My method is to simply work on it a little every day. One paragraph at a time, so far. I hope to be able to work on bigger chunks of it at a time. I had become discouraged and nearly stopped working on it at all; in fact, there was a period in which I had to stay away from the laptop and let ideas develop in my mind while getting far away enough from the book to see its state more clearly. I still have a vision for it and still do not have the complete picture, but I have good faith that the rest of the picture will come in time.

I also had trouble jumping into book editing for the first time. How does one go about it? This phenomenon of hesitation is common, I’ve noticed. There is a type of subtle fear in jumping in and making changes. However, you have to jump in and not worry about it, just like you might wash a plate without worrying how to go about it. You come into the work understanding there are things wrong with it and that you want to change or delete them to create one whole work. Better yet, you enjoy it!

Hopefully you are doing well, wherever you are; don’t give up whatever you are working on, for in due season, you will reap if you do not grow weary (Galatians 6:9), and if you are having a rougher week in any way, know that a better day will come!