A New Horizon

When I started this blog, it was 2012. Since then I’ve made almost 200 blog posts under 4 different categories. Now it’s time to “kick it up a notch,” as Emeril says.

I felt led, back in the summer, to focus on my writing. I had been teaching others to write (which I loved and am grateful for the opportunity), but I had neglected my own writing. I have started three novels, several nonfiction books, but I had not finished any of them.

For 30+ years, Dennis and I have been in music publishing—all in. We have written and published hundreds of music/drama projects and even gotten some awards for those, and we were able to make a living doing it. Praise the Lord.

However, that part of our work has just faded away. Choirs are not as much a part of church life as they once were, and writing for them was the mainstay of our career. Most of the choir music publishers have shut their doors or have pared down their output dramatically. I can lament that all I want, but that won’t change the fact that that part of my life is basically over. So…here I am. What do I do now? Do I not have anything else to write?

It’s been 20 years since I published my first novel and 10 years since I published my last book. As you can imagine, a lot has changed in the publishing world over recent years. So, I’m going to re-enter this arena. But to do that I have to adapt to several things:

• The power of social media has ramped up significantly over the last decade, and I’ve only dabbled in that.
• Second, networking with others of like mind—agents, publishers, and writers—is more important than I ever thought.
• Third, I feel I need to get rid of the clutter in my mind, to listen to what God is telling me to say. That’s the hardest part.

My talented youngest son, who is a professional web designer, is helping me re-enter this world. Notice that he redesigned my web page. (If you can’t see the changes, refresh your page.) He’s willing to help me with strategies to broaden my reach to readers. This may take some time, but I’m excited to launch this new adventure.

I’ll still be feeding this blog. I’ll start sending out a newsletter periodically with updates on my work and my life. I will have some new books out and some articles to pass along to you, my loyal readers.

I don’t like to quote scripture out of context, but often the ancients, who wrote thousands of years ago, had no idea that their words would affect me in 2023. This one is an example: Isaiah was writing to a people, the Israelites, of God’s promises to deal with them, but pardon me if I share these words that still speak to me.

Isaiah 43: 18-19 “Forget the former things;
    do not dwell on the past.
 See, I am doing a new thing!”