My Story

For as long as I can remember I have loved stories. Even before I could write, I would draw pictures and staple them together in a type of book and create a story in my head. In fact, I believe my mother still has them tucked away in one of the folders she kept of mine and each one of my siblings arts.

I always thought I was a bit of a strange girl. Often times I know my brother and sisters thought so on some occasions for they were not afraid to tell me. But I didn’t mind. I actually enjoyed being different from what people perceived as “normal”. I liked my own unique look at the world around me.

Imagining fairies and elves lived in the garden and woods surrounding our house, fighting off invisible enemies that threatened my family, acting out stories (usually deaths or injuries) that came into my mind, spending long hours alone contemplating random things, creating worlds and ideas from a patch of cloud or a unique spot on the wall and, yes, talking, seemingly, to myself about lessons that needed to be learned by a character in my head. Though, sometimes it was the character in my head lecturing me about a lesson I needed to learn. Whenever I heard or read stories, real or fiction, I always liked to put myself in that story. To truly understand what the characters were experiencing, to be able to use all five of my senses. I was never content with just knowing what happened…I wanted to KNOW. To get in deeper and truly see for myself, to feel the pull at the heartstrings.

Yes, for as long as I can remember, I had a knack for finding myself in these situations, and I loved them. I looked for different ways to look at things in every day life; I LOOKED for ways to be different and a rebel. But I never thought much about how good I was at what I did, or what I would even do with it if I was.

As one of five children who were homeschooled by a brilliant mother, I got to see talents unfold in so many unique ways. I was always awed by my brother’s artistic talent in drawing, and his hands were great at fashioning beautiful creations out of wood and metal and just about any type of material he could find. My sisters also excelled at artistic skills, designing, building, speaking and just about anything with their hands.

I did not have these talents. Though I am a perfectionist and care about details, I was harsh and rough with my hands so my crafts were not very pretty. I had a tongue that did not like to talk much and would stumble over itself constantly, and God did not bless me with an artist’s talent. Even my writing up to that point was a flop. Pretty meaningless and just like every story out there. For a while I wasn’t sure I was good at anything. I was pretty discouraged. But my mother didn’t think the same way.

My mother liked to see her children explore. Find out what interested them and what they had a knack for. Their true God-given talents, not just what would be useful in life or what others thought should be goals. She knew to play to our strengths. She saw that my strength was not in my hands or my tongue, but in my mind. So she hunted for a way to encourage and grow that strength.

When I was fourteen, she found it. She found the One Year Adventure Novel. The curriculum that changed my life forever.

This adventure not only focused in on my skills and trained me to be better and fine toned my rough talent, but it also sent me on a journey through life. One that I am still on and whose previous lessons I will never forget and can take with me to every corner of life. This course, and its teacher, not only showed me how to improve my writing, but how to make it mean something…and how to apply the lessons I learned to every day life.

For, you see, the life we live is a story. We enjoy reading books or hearing stories of make believe characters, or reading the story of someone else’s life in history. But we often forget that we ourselves are in our very own story and adventure. True, it may not happen like it does in books, but that is what makes it so very unique. So worth living.

Over the years I have improved many of my skills and found new ones that I had never known I had. I took the lessons I had learned from my teachers to heart.

My mother taught me how to look for my God-given talents and find ways of strengthening them. Any strength or talent, no matter how small can be used in a variety of ways that we don’t even think of. My strength is in my mind, and that alone is a powerful thing. For if you put your mind to it and allow God to shape it, you can improve where you never thought you could.

My mathematical brain and love of numbers helped me fine tune and grow my love and passion for music. Though I may not have been blessed with artistic talent like my brother and sisters, I did find that I had a flare for designing in a special category in my head. I combined that with my attitude of doing things the unconventional way and taught myself how to design and create costumes for myself and each character in my stories.

My writing teacher taught me how to learn and grow my God-given talent for writing and a creative way of looking at the world around me. He also taught me how to apply what I learned about writing to every day life, and how to use that to grow in my walk with Christ. For there are so many parallels in the applications and tactics of writing a story to living a Christian life…or just living life period. But I will get into that more at another time.

Now these may all seem like random pieces to you, but they are all unique pieces of the same puzzle. Pieces that come together to create what God named me. These were all parts of the start of my story. What got me to where I am today.

We all have a story to tell. You don’t have to be an author, a lover of stories or a good writer to tell it. The neat thing about stories is that they can be told in many different ways. And one great way is to live your life, learn the lessons that God has for you, LOOK for what He wants to teach and say to you, learn from the past, those who have come before you and keep trekking through to that next chapter, that next adventure. There is always something to learn and grow from on the next page.

Then pass on what you have learned to others. To your children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, siblings, friends…or even strangers who may need to hear your story. Our stories are not just for us. They are meant to benefit, help and teach others as well as ourselves. Each page we turn, each chapter we live through, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant, has a greater impact than we realize. It may not be to us, but it may be just what someone else needs. How wonderful to be a part of a story like that!

We all have a story to tell. This was the beginning of mine. But my story is not over yet. Neither is yours. What will be next, I wonder? What new adventures will we find on the next page? What will be the next piece of the Grand Story to fall into place?

Care to find out with me?