Serendipity in Storytelling
I’ve never had some revelatory or climactic story about the first time I knew I was a writer or poet, but the boxes and shelves with reams of notebooks, journals, and loose-leaf paper in the corners of my home paint a different story. I spent most of my extracurricular time during high school entering and winning poetry contests. I took several creative writing courses in college, but before publishing my first collection of poetry, being an author had not been a long-lived dream of mine.
Writing, and more specifically, poetry, has been a deeply spiritually-driven compulsion to immortalize the musings that seem to drop into my stomach and wrap themselves around my heart and lungs. I cannot sleep or breathe without writing them. But my story is not about me. Nor is this my attempt to use my platform for discipleship. It’s simply a woman finally understanding where her intuition comes from and making space for the still small voice of wisdom that calls her to use her gift to tell a bigger story.
That story is about perfect timing. More importantly, I think the moment you publish your first work is your ideal timing. I have referred to myself in more than one setting as a recovering perfectionist. Still, I want to note that my definition of perfection here isn’t about high-achieving or the progress-stalling meticulousness of striving for the unattainable. Instead, it’s about the ability of happenstance and coincidence to leave you speechless.
After receiving my undergraduate degree, I chose to pursue a career in public health. For the next 15 years, I worked as a researcher, program manager, and improvement scientist for adult and pediatric hospitals throughout the DC-Maryland-Virginia area. I accomplished a lot and was always successful in my roles, but I found myself constantly searching for the next thing that would feel more like my vocation than a paycheck. The end of a long-term relationship sent me looking for ‘the one’ in dating apps, which led me to the first man I’ve dated with whom I not only shared my passion for poetry but also encouraged me to write more.
Writing, and more specifically, poetry, has been a deeply spiritually-driven compulsion to immortalize the musings that seem to drop into my stomach and wrap themselves around my heart and lungs.
I wrote countless metaphors and played with the diction and meter in my villanelles only to find myself stalling every step of the way. It was becoming clear that I had words worth sharing, but I didn’t yet have a story worth sharing. At least not until I braved the herculean task of taking a chance on genuinely loving someone and being heartbroken, braving deep-seated trauma and anger about faith and religion with vulnerability, and fighting the discomfort of distrust by building a community with whom I can be authentic and with whom I can share my many failures.
It was the process of collecting pieces of myself off cold bathroom tile, swallowing the anvil of reality, and climbing through countless trails on mountainsides that birthed my first collection about the wickedness and loveliness of growth, discovering my purpose and the audacity it requires to take each next step.
Steps that included living through all these transitions and writing the poetry of emotion along the way; reading books by my favorite and independent poets and writers; finding a mentor and friend who is going through or has gone through the process of writing and publishing or with whom you can share resources about writing; attending countless writing workshops and panels through James River Writers and other local organizations; learning about the business of authorpreneurship; and working with an editor who understands your voice and who can help you build cohesion in your story or collection. It was these steps and many more that turned a calling into a perfect bound six-by-nine something of mine.
It was these steps and many more that turned a calling into a perfect bound six-by-nine something of mine.
Had I decided not to swipe right on a thoughtful yet brief dating profile, I wouldn’t have learned that loving, like all the worthwhile endeavors in life, requires risk. And had I decided not to step foot into a church after 10 years of running from God, I wouldn’t have built some of the best friendships I’ve ever had—the very people who stepped in to be the healers, intercessors, and confidants with whom I learned to build the life I desire. Had I decided not to go into public health, I wouldn’t have known how to have tough conversations about health and wellness, which is a significant focus of my first poetry collection. I likely also wouldn’t have had the funding and freedom to take the risk of self-publishing and building my own imprint.
But the story isn’t just a series of events. While I was running from my pain and even from God, He pushed me closer to it, to my purpose, and to Him. I was worried about whether this or that stanza needed a hard return or whether my book cover met the specifications for printing all the while He has been unfolding my life before my eyes so perfectly timed. He uses every story, undefined by good or evil, for a sum greater than its parts because He has been and always is the story.
If you’re interested in publishing your own book or have an idea for a literary work of art, you can get started today with The Poetic Method Publishing.
