I have been absent here over the last few weeks as I’ve worked literally night and day to prepare for SheSpeaks, my first official writer’s conference, where I will be pitching More: My Search for That Which Really Satisfies, my manuscript about the struggles outline here on this blog.  The proposal has been professionally critiqued not once but twice, my promotional materials look AWESOME, and I’m working today on my pitch speech.  It has been a whirlwind, to say the least.

As I’ve thought about this conference, I’ve vacillated between confidence and paralyzing fear a few (hundred) times.  There are times I wonder what the HECK I was thinking.  There are times I wonder who on EARTH would want to hear what I have to say. There are times I think it was incredibly narcissistic to think I could/would write a book and that people might actually BUY it.  But then there are other times.  Times when God quiets my spirit and reminds me where this journey began, and what He whispered in ear about the outcome.  And so I calm down.  And I bury my head in my work so as to not let fear distract me.

In light of this struggle, I have been very careful, in thinking about this upcoming event, to manage my expectations for the outcome with kid gloves .  Would I love to leave with an agent?  Yes.  Would I love to leave with a book deal?  Yes.  Do I anticipate that happening? To quote Miracle Max in The Princes Bride, “It would take a miracle.”

I am choosing to focus, instead, on “laying down tracks” right now, based on a wonderful guest post I read recently by Kathi Lipp on Rachell Gardner’s blog:

It’s time to invest, time to lay down the groundwork, so that when the season comes to live your dream, you are ready.

In one of my favorite movies, Under the Tuscan Sun, there’s a scene where the lead character, Francis, is kicking herself for buying a villa in Tuscany. It’s a big, beautiful house—perhaps too big for a woman who is single and has no children. She cries to her friend and real estate agent, Martini, “I bought a house for a life I don’t even have.”

I will never forget the words Martini encourages her with: “Signora, between Austria and Italy, there is a section of the Alps called the Semmering. It is an impossibly steep, very high part of the mountains. They built a train track over these Alps to connect Vienna and Venice. They built these tracks even before there was a train in existence that could make the trip. They built it because they knew some day, the train would come.”

That is the kind of faith we need for our dreams. To know that someday, the train will come. To know that someday, we will have time to live out our dreams. To put down visible, tangible signs saying, “This is the life I’m going to lead. I am preparing the way for what is going to happen. I know that God is faithful to finish what He starts, and He is faithful to complete this in me.”

Laying down track looks different for each of us. It may mean signing up for a class or subscribing to a magazine related to your passion. For some people, it is just admitting to a friend (or even to themselves) that they do have a dream, and that they want to see it become a reality.

I have admitted my dream, dear friends.  And I am laying down tracks to make it a reality.  I pray that you will do the same.

And so I’m off to continue my work–there is a lot of ground to cover if this train is ever going to make it all the way to its destination.  I want to be ready when the conductor finally arrives.

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