I just about titled this blog “the lurning Curve.” just to mess with people…and because upon writing this I’m a bit tired from Easter Vigil festivities.
When it comes to writing (and publishing) your own book, there is, I’ve learned, a giant learning curve. You see, when I set out to write the book, I told almost no one, including my parents. As I wrote the first draft all of five of my closest friends knew I was writing a book. Even among those five only 2 or 3 knew what the whole thing was about and why I was writing it in the first place. I figured that I wanted to make sure I’d actually write it and be able to do so without a million voices telling me what to do. When I finished the first draft, I gave my parents one of the first copies I’d printed out and told them what I’d been up to.
I know I’ve said it here before, but writing a book is a long, long process. I can’t tell you how many people in the last few months have congratulated me for doing something that so many people talk about but never do. In the last few weeks I’m slowly figuring out why so many people talk about writing a book but never actually finish it, much less publish it: it is a lot of work! In a lot of ways, writing the book was the easy part. I could lock myself in my room and just write, let the words flow from the Holy Spirit’s inspiration onto my computer screen. It was beautiful, it was inspiring, it was healing. That isn’t to say that everything I’ve done since I finished the first draft has been the bane of my existence, but the days have been trying.
Writing the book proposals took nearly as long as it did to write the first draft of the book. Waiting on the book proposals took even longer, and getting the rejections was an experience I don’t care to repeat. Then, even while I was waiting to hear back from publishers, God called my heart to self-publishing. Great! I’m glad You don’t want this book to become a giant pile of dust, God! It sounded so easy and effortless…until I really got into it. In the last couple of months I’ve learned more about online sales, tax rates, tax laws, copyright laws (don’t even get me started on this one), formatting, citation formulas, graphic design, marketing, social networking, the English language, and spiritual warfare than I ever thought I’d need to know. Let me tell you, it is the last one in that list that trips me up more often than I would have imagined. I don’t mind learning about taxes and copyright laws (minus the fact that I now have to take out every lyric I’ve quoted in the book, and if you know me or you’ve been following this blog for a while, you can imagine how many songs I quoted). I don’t mind learning, in fact, it has been kind of fun.
The spiritual warfare has not.
I debated about writing about the darker side of writing a book. I like that this blog is usually nice and happy, but the truth is that the amount of spiritual warfare that happens when you writing a book is astounding. However, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. When you write an entire section on the lies that Satan tells women and do your darnedest to expose them, I imagine Satan gets a bit ticked off, to put it lightly. I’m not sure that I say it quite this way in the book but Satan fights dirty. Last week I promised that for Holy Week I would keep my cyber-yap shut about the book. In a way, it was a relief, but in a way, it opened the door for Satan to really get me worried about the book and whether or not it will be ready on time. I worry that I shouldn’t bother publishing it at all.
What is my point in all of this? Writing a book (and publishing it yourself) is hard work. Satan fights dirty. But, if Satan is fighting against you, you must be on to something good, something God wants of you. Satan doesn’t bother attacking you if he likes what you are doing, he comes after you when you start following God with reckless abandon. The wonderful truth about Easter is that Christ has conquered Satan, once and for all of us. So follow God. Piss Satan off.
Oh yeah, and keep praying for the book, and if you wouldn’t mind, keep praying for me. There’s a lot that still needs to get done before May 14th so that y’all can get your book on time! Speaking of which…you can now go here to pre-order signed copies of Worthy! Y’all are just the best, HAPPY EASTER!
