My 93-day window of time to write a book is well over a third of the way closed (or open, depending on how I choose to look at it). And I’m far from a third finished. At this point, panic is an option. Or at least rising stress – that would be my usual response. Yet while praying this morning, another window began to open for me, a window of understanding and trust.
What began to seep into my mind while praying is this: my three-month deadline is artificial and has no meaning beyond the meaning you or I may give it. My prideful self would choose to make the deadline a matter of success or failure. That’s where the stress and eventual panic would come in.
Or, I could choose to give no meaning to the deadline and just focus on trusting Jesus – trusting Him to show me the way to the completion of this book, with no concern for when that happens. The deadline then becomes only a fun way to help motivate myself to write this book, with no stress, only trust.
Guess which one I’ve chosen.
(August 24, 2015: day 40 down, 53 more to go, of The Challenge… to write a book, from concept to self-publish, in 3 months.)