Dreams
Two years ago I spoke with Holley at a blogging conference called Relevant (now Allume). I was star struck and she was personal, real, and awesome. If you have ever spoken with her, you know Holley has a way about her that causes you to blurt out dreams you have kept hidden in your heart for years. She asked me what I wanted to do next and I said, “Oh, I don’t know, maybe write a book?” She answered back, “You should do that.” I smiled and thought, “I can’t believe I said that out loud.” Dreams that peak out of our hidden places have a tendency to mock us, you know.
About a year ago, I began to call myself a writer. I let that dream out of the hidden place and put it on display for all to see. I found out along the way that other writer girls felt the same way. We cheered each other onward. We gave God our pens and asked Him to write through us.
The story God chose to write through me was one of hope for moms who were feeling buried by life. I had the chance to share this journey with my friend Brooke McGlothlin. We wrote for seven weeks, back and forth and in the end turned it into a tiny e-book called “Hope for the Weary Mom”. We put it on Amazon for a small fee. To our surprise it sold quite well. We began to dream about turning “Hope” into a full-length book.
Disappointments
Last spring, a publisher interested in turning “Hope for the Weary Mom” into a real book contacted us. You know, the kind of book you can hold in your hands with real pages? We also talked with an agent who thought we had something special. We poured out our hearts in a fancy book proposal. We wrote chapters. We interviewed. We danced with them for months. We put our dream on hold while they had meetings and cancelled meetings. And in the end, they passed.
Dreams that slip away hurt like crazy. The pain is real. I spent the better part of that dream crushing day wading through the river of disappointment. I wondered what we should do. My heart wanted my dream to crawl back to the hidden place where it would be safe from rejection. Have you ever tried to stuff a dream back inside your heart? It is kind of like trying to put all those crazy clowns back into their Volkswagen Bug. They weren’t made for the small places. They were made to soar.
Divine Detours
Brooke and I prayed through it, over it, and around it and decided to publish, “Hope for the Weary Mom” ourselves. This time we added new words, extra chapters and a whole lot more hope. We recruited a lovely group of women to help us launch the new book, my amazing husband designed a stunning hope-filled cover, and we placed it in God’s capable hands. The crazy thing is because the traditional publishing route did not work out, we are able to dream even bigger dreams and walk by faith with the one who wrote the message in the first place.
God knew. He had not given up on “Hope.” His plan all along was that He would market our book. What I thought was the death of a dream, turned into a divine detour. The amazing thing to me is this book began as a blog post on 29 Lincoln Avenue a little over one year ago. It was one moment of honesty God has turned into a ministry. I am humbled He has chosen this as a vehicle for me to encourage women. I am looking forward to where it will lead.
The new “Hope for the Weary Mom: Where God Meets You in Your Mess” by Stacey Thacker and Brooke McGlothlin releases today. It is free on Amazon for Kindle readers for the first 48 hours of October 23 and October 24, 2012. After that it will be available for $7.99 for Kindle and $9.99 via Create Space. For more details go to hopeforthewearymom.com.
Stacey Thacker is Mike’s wife and the mother of four vibrant girls. You can find her blogging at 29lincolnavenue where her passion is to encourage your heart, grow together and talk about the stuff of life. She is also the co-founder of MODsquad Blog (for Mothers of Daughters) and an community leader for (in)courage. You can also find her on Twitter and Facebook where she usually hangs out with a cup of coffee in her hand.
