What if writers stopped writing from a place of inspiration and instead wrote from a place of gratitude?
As we turn the corner from a season marked by words like thanksgiving, thanks, grateful, Books & Such Literary Management doesn’t only want to express our gratitude for you who frequent or have stumbled upon this blog.
We’d like to also explore what it might be like to view our writing from a place of gratitude.
What if before our fingers touched the laptop keys waiting for them, we took time to fully feel and fully express our gratefulness?
Writing from a Place of Gratitude
- For words and their ability to rearrange us
- For the privilege of writing
- For the gift of imagination
- For the tools of our craft
- For the authors who’ve gone before us, taught us, mentored us
- For the ability to publish in a multitude of formats
- For readers
- For reviewers
- For our support teams
- For those who purchase books because no matter the price, it’s a bargain
- For our agents đ
- For editors, freelance and otherwise
- For marketing teams and sales teams and art departments and warehouse fulfillment
- For writer friends
- For books that guide us in the craft
- For books that inspire strength and courage
- For retailers
- For libraries and librarians
- For bookmobiles and Little Free Libraries
- For paper and ink
- For ideas
- For the intersection of what we have to say and what the world needs to hear
- For The Author
You may find it beneficial to consider the above list and add to it before you begin your next writing session or season.
Or you may want to pray a prayer like this one:
Keep my fingers nimble
And my mind agile.
Fill me with wild ideas, Lord,
Then tame them for Your glory.
As I sit in my storytelling chair
Draw around me those
Longing for a good story
That will keep their souls nimble
And their minds agile
And their imaginations dancing
With wild ideas
That give You glory.
Amen.
Why Writing Authentically Is so Hard
Wild ideas that give Him glory! Oh, how I love this. ⨠Posting thisâand your listâon my inspo board.
Thanks for the encouragement, Laurie. Glad it blessed.
I love this encouragement! When I sit in the midst of gratitude, my work and my world feels expansive!
Love the idea “expansive”!
Cynthia, I am so grateful for you and your mentorship in our lives! What a marvelous idea. Begin with thankfulness. Why wait until January 1st to shape our resolutions? Begin now and give Him the glory. God Bless!
Great idea, Ginny!
Love the prayer. Printing it out and putting it in my line of sight when I’m at the computer. Thanks for the mentoring and the food for thought! You are a blessing to me!
I appreciate your comments, Kim.
Oh, Cynthia. This is so good! This morning, I am taking a moment to thank the Lord for a quiet place to read my Bible, for having an office for the first time in my life (I recently inherited a home from my grandparents), for a beautiful view of the forest and meadow, for having our 3 teen sons home just a little bit longer, for crazy ideas and the desire to tell tales, for the Great Storyteller at work in us, and for the possibility, the hope, the chance to delight children with story.
Glorious thoughts!
Inspiring, especially with the reminder list of who and what we should be grateful for. So easy to forget some one or some thing in our busy, busy lives. The prayer covers the subject extremely well.
Thank you, Peggy!
Dear Cynthia,
You have this uncanny gift, as I sit here in my âstorytelling chairâ, to create the sense that youâre sitting beside me, speaking these words to save and treasure, right into my heart.
What a gift.
Iâm printing it out.
Thank youâ
and I am so grateful that I âstumbledâ upon this blog!âşď¸
Deb
I’m grateful, too!
I’m also thankful for writers conferences, and also for the internet that helps us learn and connect.
Ah, yes! Writers conferences and the internet!
I will print this and keep it at my desk.
Grateful it is useful to you!
I’m grateful for the ones I love,
I’m grateful for the rain.
I’m grateful for the sky above,
and grateful for the pain
that straitens life and hobbles days
and stands me at the brink
of the cliff, now out of ways
to avoid the need to think
about God and eternity,
about the value of the Now,
about the lack of certainty
of my soul, and how
I might align more to God’s will
in the time I’m living still.
Again, beautifully said.
I love this prayer poem! I’m grateful for the adventures I live through the stories he gives me, but I hope he addles my mind and still my fingers if I fail to glorify Him in the telling.
Profound, Laquita!
Thank you, dear Cynthia. I love the post, I love the poem. There’s no better place to write than under the guidance of God and His gracious workers. I’m thankful for godly literary agencies and godly agents who help tame manuscripts and proposals for God’s glory. đ
Blessings ~ Wendy Mac
Thanks for your KIND additions!
Thank you for this, Cynthia. It’s so easy to come to writing work with fear (What if no one likes what I write? What if I’m no good? What if I run out of ideas?) and discontentment (Why can’t I just write and not have to think about marketing and representation?). Your list takes all these thoughts captive for obedience to Christ who has told us in His Word to rejoice always, pray without ceasing and in everything give thanks.
And then your beautiful prayer…
I needed this today!
Jody, what beautiful insights you added!
“For paper and ink.”
This made me think of Jane Austen. I’m so very grateful I live in a time where I can choose to write at my computer or sit with a notebook and a ball point pen.
I was able to write with a quill while at the Jane Austen museum. I marvel at Jane’s perseverance to have been able to write 6 novels using that “pen.”
Imagine the smudges.
And the gasps if she spilled the ink. (she had to make the ink too…) We’re so spoiled.
I have no excuses.
Thanks for the reminder.
“I have no excuses.” đ What a beautiful reminder!
Ahhhh, I needed this today. Thank you for the reminder of the power of gratitude on us, on our hearts, and on our writing. When I take the time to stop and practice gratitude, I sense the Lord’s pleasure and His nearness.
Imagine sitting before our computers EMPOWERED by gratitude!