Finding My Words

About 15 years ago I took a writing class. I know the technical "why" I took the class but I still don't fully understand the heart "why" that propelled me forward. I am an introvert to the core and I love to go deep. I am perfectly happy to mine the recesses of my mind and explore the inner world, so writing is a good fit, but before the class I never in my wildest dreams would have considered myself a writer. I only considered myself an insecure wife and mother who loved her family but wasn't really good at much of anything. I saw myself as a failure.

When I took the writing class I was shocked to find a great big clue to who God created me to be. God plants seeds of gifts within each one of us and when a long-dormant seed, a seed you didn't even know existed deep down beneath the surface of your life, suddenly sends a tiny, weak shoot up through the rocky soil of your heart, well it catches your attention in a rather loud way. Something inside me came alive. In the Cinderella happily-ever-after version of my story I would have faithfully put fingers to keyboard and poured out the contents of my heart. In the reality show version I write something occasionally, barely. It sounds so cliche, but I never feel more alive than when I'm writing. It's the best thing I can do for me. And I don't do it.

This morning I sat in my parents' living room visiting with them and my dad's brother John. Uncle John is a successful writer and speaker, and he turned to me and told me he loves to read what I write. That there is truth in my words. I sat on my parents' couch and the Holy Spirit whispered. God told me a long time ago that he wants me to write, but I distract myself with graphic design and Pinterest and Facebook and church and laundry and dinner. Anything but what God has told me to do.

I never see the world or my confused and messy mind more clearly than when I write. There is healing in the writing. Just because it feels powerful and amazing and exciting, that doesn't mean it's easy. But today I have that fresh reminder that I don't write because I like it (which I do). I write because God has told me to write.