Since I was a little girl, I’ve wanted to be a writer. Honestly, you probably already knew that because I’ve written about this dream many times since I started TTT in 2015.
Well, my dream finally came true this year. In July, I signed my first book contract. I’m a published author now. Yet this season of life actually feels unexpectedly anticlimactic.
Cue the Confetti?
Of course, I’m grateful to Ambassador International for giving me a book contract. But I don’t feel the way that I thought I was going to feel when I signed it. Instead of feeling like I’m thriving, I feel like I’m floundering.
What am I supposed to do now? How do I get this book to sell? What if it doesn’t sell? What if I don’t become famous like I secretly desire?
To be honest, I really don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know how to promote a book so that millions of copies will sell. I don’t know how to find speaking engagements or do a book tour or collaborate with other authors. I don’t know how to make this book succeed so that I can write another book and another book and another book.
Trust me, the reality of signing a book contract is a lot more anticlimactic than it is in movies and TV shows. Life goes on as it always has but with a bit of additional stress. I still have a normal full-time job. I still love being silly with my family, watching chick flicks with my friends, and sleeping in on Saturday mornings.
But this whole book publishing thing isn’t just anticlimactic because life goes on as it always has. It’s also anticlimactic because the struggles that I describe in my book are still very real for me. They didn’t disappear when I decided to write this book or sign this contract.
I Still Struggle
My book about eating disorder recovery is set to release in less than three months, yet I still struggle with my own eating disorder recovery.
Recently, I lost a little weight (not the good kind of losing weight—the unhealthy kind). I’m struggling to eat enough calories to maintain my weight because deep down, I’d like to lose weight. It’s a slippery slope back down to anorexia, which is the same place I was at years ago, yet I often wonder what it’d be like to go back. So yes, I did write a book and sign the book deal. But I still have so much growing left to do.
Therefore, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude. See to it that there is no one who takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception in accordance with human tradition, in accordance with the elementary principles of the world, rather than in accordance with Christ. (Colossians 2:6-8 NASB)
Signing a book deal hasn’t changed my life. Of course, I hope that God will use my book to change others’ lives. But I’m still so very normal…and so very human.
Tizzie's Tidbits of Truth 