The Decision Has Been Made!

Well, I have finally made the decision that I have been praying about for quite some time. As a matter of fact, I have been thinking about, praying about and contemplating it ever since last August when I finished writing Gratitude Greens. I have officially chosen the topic of my next book!  Actually, I didn't choose it at all. God did. I just had to wait it out until He revealed it to me.

As I sat down last week, mulling over my many (quite varied) ideas of book subjects, I narrowed it down to just 7.  Seven? Yes. I had 7 different ideas about what I might write about next, and boy! were they all over the board. I like all of them for different reasons, but now I realize how much information I really need in order to be able to write an entire, full-length book on a single subject.

I worked on Gratitude Greens for almost 3 years, and after all was said and done, it ended up being just 104 pages.  Now, for my first book, I guess that's not too bad, but I wanted it to be longer, more substantial feeling.

So, I go into this next book with much more information and realistic aspirations than I had with the first one.  I know how written pages (yes, I hand-write everything first-it's the only way my creativity can flow freely) translate into much fewer typed pages. Then, after editing, formatting and putting it into book form, it ends up seeming much shorter than I first anticipated. So, of these 7 different ideas, none of them just jumped out at me as something I could write an entire book on.  At least, not yet. So, I waited....

And then, on Thursday, I grabbed one of my journals (I have several sitting around), and in it I found a note I had written quite a while back-I don't even remember when. It listed 2 more ideas for books that I had completely forgotten about.  One of them stuck out to me right away, and I felt myself get that excited feeling I have been waiting to get again, "I think I found my next subject!"  I prayed over it and slept on it and then prayed some more.  Then, just to be certain, I sat down and started writing an introduction.  And it just flowed. One idea led to another which led to another.  Yay! I had found my topic.

Obviously, God wanted me to find it in His timing, like He does with everything else. But, I am so excited and so optimistic about writing my next book, and I can't wait to see what He has in store for it. I have just a broad, basic idea of what it will include and what impact I hope it will have on my readers, but I know God has plans for it that I can't even imagine right now.

I am not going to divulge the exact topic of my book, because for some reason it takes something away from my writing experience when I talk about it before I write about it.  I always feel very protective of the work that I feel the most passionate about.  I will say that it will be another God-centered, inspirational and encouraging book.  I plan to include my own experiences as well as the experiences of people I admire and respect, and I can't wait to see who God directs me to include in this exciting new endeavor.  Maybe it'll be you!