Isaiah 40:31

Sometimes in life, there are random, precious moments, moments when you remember you have a blog. This is one of those moments...

So, yeah! Definitely have a blog and totally didn't forget about it. I last typed up a good ol' post back in July of last year, when Driscol took over my blog and decided to complain about his lack of words in my novel (speaking of which, he seems to be finding a personality nowadays - it kind of freaks me out). But lately, I've come to the realization that I allowed my characters to take complete control of my blog, meaning no posts in the perspective of yours truly. I was actually okay with that (I love my characters, contrary to popular belief >.>), but it has dawned on me lately that, if I seriously want to be a writer, I should write, which is something I haven't done in a while now.

I've been writing since I was eight - novels, fanfiction, plays, poems, you name it. It brought me joy, to invent stories and characters and adventures. It excited me that God had given me the ability to create. He had blessed me with a gift and, whether anyone read my stories or not, I was loved writing, and I loved Him. However, it wasn't until November of 2013 when I truly found myself bursting with excitement, ready to put whatever God wanted onto the page in front of me. On the first day of NaNoWriMo, I wrote over five thousand words at one time and I found that I no longer loved writing - I was in love with it. That had never happened before and, as the month went on, I found my excitement growing.

This wasn't at all what I'd expected, for I was working on a fantasy novel of all things and I'd never written one before. But I found a genre I loved and it was then when I realized how much writing meant to me. I continued with that story for months, rewriting some of it, trying to finish the first draft. Even the frustrating moments were beautiful. I could see so much of Jesus, so much of His love, in that story and it kept me writing.

Although it was clear a sequel was in order, I wasn't so sure I was ready to work on yet another year of the same novel, the same characters. I figured trying something new in 2014 would be a nice break from the plot and characters who were constantly on my mind. And so began a spur-of-the-moment YA novel that ended a couple hours after it started. Why, you ask? Because Lorcan, Cahira, and the others were relentless and demanded their story continue. So, that was that - not far into NaNo and I found myself leaping into a new story with no planning whatsoever. It started off rather slow and it took me days to catch up after being far behind, but the story was moving along nicely and the characters were actually cooperating (although Elroy wanted to hog the majority of three chapters).

However, all of that came to a screeching halt when real life stuff happened. I won't go into detail, because this post is long enough, but I'd never been so stressed out in my life. I felt as though everything around me was falling apart and instead of writing becoming a stress-relieving thing, it felt like the stress was a huge wall, keeping me from what I loved most. I attempted to write for several days, but the brick wall remained and I had no idea what was on the other side, much less how to get around it. Days turned into weeks and, before I knew it, weeks had turned into months. Suddenly, I wasn't writing at all. I was constantly on edge and a lifetime of writing seemed like a distant memory.

I wrote a little in that time, but my novels had been terribly neglected and, although I thought about them every once in a while, the brick wall of stress was still there and with it came anger. What had been an incident, one terrible moment, had turned into terrible weeks and months. What had started as stress and sorrow had turned into anger, slowly boiling into fury. Before, I would have dealt with this by writing, by spending more time with my Heavenly Father. But what had began as a brick wall was turning into a brick mountain and I felt no need to write, or pray.

The God aspect of the situation resolved itself fairly quickly. Even when I felt I didn't understand God, I knew He loved me. And even when people drove me crazy, I realized He was always there for me, and He wanted what was best. It was through one of the hardest times in my life that I realized that Jesus truly loved me and He would never leave me. Yeah, everything else looked like it was falling apart, but one thing remained: His love. In all of my anger and frustration, in all the time I had spent feeling sorry for myself, God's love hadn't changed. He still saw me as worthy, as beautiful, His creation. He still does. And, even as the water rises around me, I realize that His love is real and He is real. He is here, so why should I worry? His life becomes more evident each day and, even then, I felt His love surrounding me.

The writing thing went unnoticed, however. I wrote a little here and there, but I didn't find myself missing it. For the first time in my entire life, I didn't want to write. But all of that changed a few days ago.

I have no idea why I checked my email. Maybe it was because I missed the Purple Elephants, or it just crossed my mind, or I wanted to stalk the blogs of my friends, but I logged in that day and it was then when I stumbled across a blog post by my dear friend Deborah O'Carroll (aka Celtic) at The Road of a Writer (check out her blog - she's amazing ^_^). In her post, she mentioned she had been on a three week writing hiatus and that, in that time, she had done a lot of blogging. However, she came to the realization that she was blogging so much because that was "as close to writing as I could get." Needless to say, that really got me thinking.

In the three months that had passed since the November incident, I hadn't found myself missing writing, longing to write no matter what it took. I wondered why this had happened. Could it have been perhaps that I had lost interest, that my time as a writer was over? Could it be that I had pushed it away in an effort to keep everything else away as well? Why didn't I miss it? Or, somewhere behind that brick wall, did I actually long to write again?

As I set out to discover this, I read a few paragraphs of my novel from NaNoWriMo 2013; this led to few more paragraphs, to a couple sections, to several chapters. Suddenly, I found myself smiling, my heart filling with joy as I read of all the perils and adventures my characters had encountered. It was in those moments that I remembered the fun I'd had writing the story, the excitement I'd felt then returning in an instant. It was a spark that started a flame. I found myself eager to return to writing and to finish the adventures of my dear, neglected characters. Deborah, incredible as always, had inspired me to love writing again and to give it another chance, in spite of the brick wall I'd thought was keeping me from it.

Turns out the brick wall was just me.

You see, I think, sometimes, we find ourselves building walls to protect ourselves. The world can be harsh and mean; it can make us want to hide and lock ourselves away behind walls and mountains. It can be a scary place. But I've also found that it can be beautiful. I've found that the tough moments come to help us grow and the journey is so much greater than the destination. I've learned that building walls isn't fun. Yeah, it keeps the ugly things out, but, in turn, keeps beautiful things from coming in - things like writing, friends, and God.

I've learned that it isn't important how others see me, it's important how God sees me. And He sees me as righteous and beautiful and His. Because that's who I am.

I am His.

So, my writing has begun again. I've found that worshiping Jesus is my favorite thing to do. And, on top of everything, I'm learning to just be me, because that's enough. And I like the Jill who worships and writes and dances in the rain. I like the Jill with fire instead of brick walls. Jesus does, too. ^_^

With all of that said, I have returned to write and I already have a couple more blog posts planned! Be expecting some actual excerpts from my novel (meaning you shall meet the characters for real this time >:D) and maybe even a few surprises along the way. ;) Thanks for reading. You're beautiful. <3

"But those who trust in the Lord for help will find their strength renewed.

They will rise on wings like eagles;

They will run and not get weary;

They will walk and not grow weak."

-Isaiah 40:31