Not kidding. If Reverend Jim Halbert from my church, Crossroads Community, would go to Hawaii for a six-week sabbatical, I could probably finish Hope Givers. I guess a girl could write forever about Hope, but at some point, I’ve just got to stop writing and writing and writing and move on to the publishing process.
I started writing Hope Givers in 2012, the year that my first book, Juxtaposed, came out. The idea behind my second book was that as I was going out to different churches and speaking about the vigilance we need to have in regard to child sexual abuse within our own congregations, people – lots of people – started telling me their own horror stories. And as counter intuitive as it sounds, my heart was filled with hope as these beautiful souls admitted, many for the first time, that they’d been abused.
Don’t get me wrong – it was hard to hear. Believe me, I’ve sat in my bathtub with tears streaming, my face in my hands lamenting, Lord, there are so, so many…
But I also recognized the fact that the walls of silence that had imprisoned these men and women for so much of their lives were crumbling at their feet! Simply speaking out and advocating for themselves proved empowering and liberating and redeeming, each syllable emancipating them from their own personal private hells.
They gave me hope.
They needed hope.
And a sequel was born in me for which I had the highest aspirations.
But as soon as 2013 hit, and I mean hit – with a barrage of one heart-wrenching tragedy after another – this little book lost its purchase, lost its message, and lost all momentum.
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What did I know about hope? What could I tell my dear friends and family who had lost their children? Lost their spouses? Lost their hope?
I printed out all the chapters I’d written, three-hole punched them, stuffed them in a hot pink binder, and shoved every pathetic page between some Nora Roberts novel and Roget’s Thesaurus.
This project for which I had so much hope sat ignored for months. I kept writing for my blog, I cried with my loved ones, I took editing jobs, my heart lamented for those near me who were suffering, I recruited my RAIN Writers to write for my magazine, and I wondered if this little book would ever have a life.
It wasn’t until I sat with those I love who were in excruciating and debilitating pain until they could breathe again that I discovered what this next book really needed to be. I had to become a Hope Giver – someone who intentionally and deliberately put herself in close proximity to the suffering of others, for the sole purpose of pouring hope into their lives – before I could write this book.
This book has overcome even more obstacles that threatened to snuff out its existence: I didn’t realize I’d written a sequel to Juxtaposed until Image may be NSFW.
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my agent broke the news to me that he couldn’t pitch it to the big publishing houses like he’d wanted to. It’s hard to pitch a sequel to a publisher who has no knowledge of what the first book is about, right?
Everyone and anyone in the industry hated my cover concept, and I had to concede to those who know better than I and give it up.
I returned to my first publisher, but that deal did not come to fruition either.
Now I will be learning a gargantuan amount about self-publishing.
And now?
As my journey with this project continues, I wonder if I’m even finished writing it? Then there is the issue of my pastor – who just won’t stop giving me material. Just when I think I’m about done, I plop myself down at church, the 9:00 AM service, left side, second row… and off he goes, being all inspiring and stuff…
It’s a problem.
In any case, this book, by golly, is going to have a life of her own. I can feel it… like labor pains, I can feel it! Ultimately, I’ve given this little book to God so many times. Surrender has been a key component in this journey of mine as I continue to learn what it means to be a Hope Giver.
I will keep you posted.
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Daisy Rain Martin is an author, speaker, advocate, and educator as well as a founding member of The Flying M-Inklings Writing Group. Her comedic memoir, Juxtaposed: Finding Sanctuary on the Outside, was Christopher Matthew’s #1 top selling book in 2012. She has a free e-book on her website for anyone who has or is currently being sexually abused called, If It’s Happened to You. Her next book, Hope Givers: Hope is Here, will be out soon. Daisy is also the Editor in Chief of RAIN Magazine, an online magazine that has been a fundraising effort for her three favorite charities and features new, up-and-coming writers. Please follow her weekly blog, SATURDAISIES, which addresses a plethora of current issues including child advocacy, all things hilarious, and matters of the heart. She would love for you to join the Rainy Dais Community by friending her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.