I've Moved!

"Inklings" can now be found at www.rachelstarrthomson.com/inklings. All of the old posts and your comments are over there, and all new posts will be posted there. Please do come by for a visit!

Blessings,
Rachel

published: Live Out Spring

How can we live out the goodness of God in our lives? By behaving much like my favourite season--spring. My latest article has been published on Ungrind.org. Check it out here.

published: Living the Past

"Living the Past," the first of three articles I'm writing on the role of Christians in the arts, has been published on Boundless.org.

I'd love to hear from you on this subject!

time to relax

Today things are rapidly coming together. In the course of this work day, Seasons should see its final tweaking finished. A ministry newsletter I've been collecting material for should be written, edited, and laid out. My Web site should be ready to launch. And my summer road trip should be fully planned.

Most days are a tangle of work, putting in hours on this project and that one, emailing people, writing hundreds and thousands of words. Every now and then the work culminates. Those moments are beautiful and rewarding.

In this case, I've been working my head off because my cousin, co-author, and co-dance tour coordinator, Carolyn Currey, arrives at the train station tomorrow at noon. We do of course have a lot of work to do once she gets here, but we also have a lot of relaxing to do. Just relaxing. Just being.

Solomon said "There is a time for every purpose under heaven," and he was right. There is a time for work and a time to lay work down--to live Sabbath. The balance is so important. Just as all work and no play sucks the luster out of Jack's life, so all play and no work makes him useless, weak, and unfulfilled.

I'm glad and grateful for the balance in my life--work that won't be ignored, projects worth being passionate about, and rest worth taking wholeheartedly.

ideals

Last week's to-do lists had several major projects marked for finishing. For finishing, that is, that week. With a performing arts tour coming up in July and various Soli Deo Gloria Ballet matters to focus on, I really wanted to get the biggest writing, editing, publishing, and formatting projects wrapped up and safely tucked away where I no longer need to think about them.

Well. Life is not generally so tidy.

I didn't actually finish any of the major projects I had listed. But that doesn't mean my lists failed! On the contrary, I got so much work done on all of these things that they are now all teetering on the brink of finished. I didn't meet my self-imposed deadlines, but I'm very, very close.

In a funny way this reminds me of the Peculiar post I wrote about the virtuous woman last week. My good friend Alexis read it, and we discussed it a bit one day. We've both heard Christian women who openly resented the Virtuous Woman of Proverbs 31, sometimes even mocking her. That, I think, is sad. It's true that this woman's industry and faithfulness make most of us look bad--they certainly convict me. But if we didn't have ideals--crazy, far-off goals to shoot for--we'd never get anywhere.

If nothing else, at least we will have lived in the light that ideals give. If we shoot for the moon, we may never reach it--but at least we shot for the moon! How much better than to live always in darkness, hiding away from the light?

Ideals are worth holding, and trying to reach, and writing about.

Making To-Do Lists

I'm not sure how I ever functioned without to-do lists.

On days when I don't make them, I get very little done. On days when I DO, life--and especially writing--moves forward at a healthy pace.

Today's to-do list includes answering email, editing articles for clients, formatting Seasons of an Irish Hermitage, blogging, writing newsletters, researching literary agents, designing a new Web site, planning a road trip, and revising Burning Light. It is broken into bite-sized time chunks: I can easily accomplish all this in a day, provided that I stay focused.

Furthermore, each item on the list is a bite-sized chunk from a bigger list: the list of projects and commitments I need to finish this summer. Each morning, I refer to that list and make sure that every project is moving ahead at the pace needed to finish on time. Of course, a few things will end up cut from the list entirely--I'm not superhuman. But having everything written down helps me prioritize.

A to-do list provides me with direction for the day, a record of what I've accomplished, and peace of mind--I know when I can take a break and when I can't, because I know exactly what needs doing and what can rest for now. As a self-employed writer/editor/writing coach, I know I couldn't function without one.

Lists are one of the major tools in my writer's arsenal. How about you? What tools and techniques keep you on track?

rowing out to the darkness

It could be that God has not absconded but spread, as our vision and understanding of the universe have spread, to a fabric of spirit and sense so grand and subtle, so powerful in a new way, that we can only feel blindly of its hem. In making the thick darkness a swaddling band for the sea, God "set bars and doors" and said, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further." But have we even come that far? Have we rowed out to the thick darkness, or are we all playing pinochle in the bottom of the boat?

- Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek