Peace Again

Well, yesterday (Sunday) I had food poisoning, the first time for that in 30 years! We went out to eat at a Mexican restaurant the night before and Sunday morning I was not feeling well at all. Had to stay home from church and didn't get a thing done writingwise all day. Didn't get much done on Saturday either, though not cause I was sick. Today though, I turned in revisions on chapters 24 and 25 and several other smaller parts, and started on the first scene in ch 30, since what I sent in with the "final" draft was no more than a place holder.

I hate doing this, and it's been bugging me. I know it's a pain for my editor and I feel like I've failed. I was supposed to have turned it in all at once, not piecemeal. But that was my plan not God's. He's teaching me to accept His timing in things, and to really trust Him beyond what I've had to do in the past. In the past I trusted Him to see the books were done by the deadline, and learned even then, (though to a lesser degree than now) that the deadline was really a human construction and He could work on both sides of the problem -- me and my editor. On one of my first books, it turned out she wasn't even going to get to work on it for a month after the assigned due date. And on this one, she keeps assuring me it's fine. It's no problem.

I guess it really isn't, beyond being a violation of my standards which say you're supposed to turn your book in complete at the agreed upon time. That's professional and reliable. Turning in a book piecemeal like this is flaky and unreliable, and I can really go into a guilt trip on it. But making myself feel guilty is a sin, so I won't. And yes, I failed. But... big deal. Everyone fails. God uses failure. His plan is not dependent on my making perfect execution all the time.

This November, when I was supposed to have turned in the book already, I agreed to try to read for endorsement a new fantasy (due Nov 30), have to decide how many copies of Arena to buy by Nov 30, agreed to attempt an online interview (due Nov 26), agreed to contribute three entries to two team blogs by the end of the month, had to arrange and prepare a birthday celebration, will have to arrange and prepare Thanksgiving, write my November newsletter (not happening) and change my blog over to Blogger beta. This in addition to finishing an online interview begun in October, catch up on email and bookmark mailing, start preparing for Christmas, plus all the other regular stuff in addition to finishing the book. Most of that isn't happening.

That long of a list starts to get me rattled and my brain flits from task to task building anxiety and guilt. Not at all where God wants me to be. It took me awhile but today I finally remembered:

There is always time to do the will of God.

And not all of those things are necessarily His will. So I put them all in His hands and will trust Him to see done the ones HE wants done, not the ones I think need to be done.

"Don't think of all you have to do, just do the next thing. And rest in Him."

So I did. Am. And I have my peace again.

Grace,
Karen