Oh what a thing, this writing!

We all have  gifts or treasures.  Some are hidden, some extracted.  Of those extracted there are those that are either polished or unpolished. 

My Extracted But Not Polished Gift Of Drawing

When I was about 13 or 14, a relative discovered by accident that I could draw.  I did not know this at the time nor did anyone.   I was not one of those kids like my cousin’s daughter. She was drawing before she could even talk!  



All pencils down!

So my drawing talent lay undiscovered till my teenage years.  My parents being who they were, once they knew I was one of those in the family who had inherited the ‘artist gene’ from my grandfather, they went all out and bought all things to do with art to develop the gift, encouraging the gift with their fullest support. 


However once I finished uni, I made one or two vague attempts to enrol in some art classes, started, but never followed it through.  Drawing was a gift that had been extracted and left unpolished.  As it stands, I could not tell you right now if I can still draw -  the only time I hold a pencil is to annotate in a book!

 My Extracted And Polished Gift

At 9 or 10, I won an international Commonwealth writing competition.  I was pushed into it by my teachers.  I found myself over my school years always being asked to be a magazine editor or do some writing.  Why or why?  I liked Maths, I had an analytical brain so why was I being asked to do this writing thing?  Again the minute I could get out of writing, apart from coursework, I got out of it. 


At work, I was the one asked to write training manuals.  Again being pushed to write..yet again.   In 2001, on giving my heart to Christ, I was once again pushed into this writing by my pastor then.  He asked me to be the church magazine editor.  I was not pleased.  In my mind, I had not told him I could even put b after a.  So why was he asking me to do this?  Was there this writing thing on my forehead for goodness sake?   I docked and dived every time I saw him.  I was not interested. 

I wanted to use my analytical brain and not my creative brain.  Cutting a long story short, God was not through with me.  It took the pastor to move to another branch, for me to actually think hard on this writing thing.  I learnt I could still be creative even though my brain loved numbers.  

I enrolled on writing courses..my first pastor had offered to pay for this..now I had to dig deep myself.  I attended writing groups.  I launched my first website in 2003, started doing blogs on and off from 2004.  I was in effect polishing this gift. 


The gift rejected became the chief cornerstone

God was very gracious and offered me new opportunities that I had turned down before in my previous church - When I got married and joined the church I am in today, I asked my pastor's wife, if I could write – yes this time I was the one asking! 

My pastor put me in touch with an amazing writing coach.  Her words are in my spirit till this day.  Subsequently I published a book with one of the top Christian publishers in 2011.  From trying to run away from this gift, I had become a published author. 


Recently, I decided to take my writing to the next much, much higher level.  There is  more land to conquer in whatever gift you have.   I have a coach again, and have  joined a writing group. I was well chuffed when my coach told me the other day that my writing was getting stronger. 

My writing is sparkling more.  Watch this space…

For inspiration on mental illness go to www.defyingmentalillness.com