Interruption of Plans or Ordained Opportunity

It’s the end of December, and for me, that means it’s time to pull out a fresh, ginormous, old-fashioned office calendar for the new year and start planning. I have gleefully begun to fill in the calendar’s little boxes.

I love to dream up a plan.

I love shiny new calendars with pristine white blocks waiting for to-do lists. I love highlighters and color-coding. In other words, I am a true believer in organization. The funny thing about plans is, a lot of times it doesn’t matter how carefully I lay out goals, something always happens to delay progress or completely derail me. Or send me off in a new direction.

That’s what happened this past year. I’d been praying for direction for some time. The time-consuming process of querying, getting requests for fulls, then getting the eventual rejections, had left me discouraged. This, combined with the state of the publishing industry, had me seriously considering self-publishing. I asked my writer friends to pray with me about what direction I should take.

After much prayer and research, I stopped querying and got busy amassing all the information I could about self-publishing, started formulating a plan, and even took a few baby steps, such as lining up an editor for the first book in my YA Contemporary series, but none of my methods were really helping me move forward in a substantial way.

Then an interruption came, or was it an opportunity?

I got a message from Jenny Knipfer, an author I’d met through reading her book and posting a review, (which I think is a pretty neat way to meet someone.) She wanted to know if I was interested in a multi-author collaboration. My immediate response was “Yes!” even though it wasn’t a YA project. I felt confident in accepting because the timing was perfect. It was an answer to prayers. A divine assignment. I’m still writing my young adult fiction and will publish at least one young adult novel in 2024, but I’d also been thinking of writing more in the time period of the book she requested. (1960s)

I can get so focused on my self-designated goals that I have trouble discerning the difference between an interruption and an opportunity, but this was a flashing neon sign.

Taking advantage of this offer was the push I needed to learn the things I needed to learn to independently publish. Signing on to the Apron Strings project forced me to prioritize what must be done and let go of what wasn’t absolutely necessary. Left to my own devices, I likely would have continued to research and weigh options. At the time Jenny contacted me, I had over-organized my plans to the point that I had a huge file on all things self-publishing, but had become overwhelmed and had stagnated. Perhaps the Apron Strings project was a heavenly kick in the pants, a get a move on, already.

It seemed like a situation tailored just for me, with a built-in support group, a few directions, and a shorter to-do list than my massive file.

I desperately needed that shove.

I’m not saying I’ll ever throw all planning out the door and just wait for favorable circumstances to appear. If I had done such a thing, I wouldn’t have been able to jump in when the opportunity presented itself. All of my previous research and attempts at organizing a publishing and marketing plan served me well.

I knew in my gut this was a gift, and God meant for me to step out. It still took faith. I didn’t feel ready. And I don’t feel ready now, but I finished writing book five for the Apron Strings series in plenty of time, and have hit all the required deadlines so far. Even so, it’s a daily faith walk, because there is so much I don’t know, and there is always more to learn. I suspect it will always be this way. I’ll never have a plan solid enough to account for all contingencies or keep me in my comfort zone, but that’s okay.

One of my new writing goals for 2024 is to be ready to hear, recognize, and respond. The next time a side project comes up, I hope I’ll remember to stay open and pray about it, not immediately discount an opportunity as an interruption.

What about you? How do you discern the difference between interruptions and opportunities?

The Apron Strings Book Series is a collection of heartfelt inspirational stories connected by one cookbook, featuring different women throughout the decades from 1920 to 2020. A new book will be released every month in 2024. Donna Jo’s book, Joann, is book five in the series and releases May 15^th, 2024.

Donna Jo Stone is an award-winning author of young adult contemporary and adult historical fiction. She writes about tough issues but always ends her stories on a note of hope. Her novels are about common struggles and finding the faith to carry on through those battles. The first book in Donna Jo’s young adult series is scheduled for publication in 2024.

To find out more, sign up for her newsletter at donnajostone.com.