07. What Is Your Why?

It’s been a low-productive week for me. Anyone else have those days?

I mean, we aren’t robots. We can’t be at 110% at all times and even though I may feel like I can defy normal writing practices, I have to remember that rest is important. Breaks are important.

Since January, I’ve been doing a ‘Writing Everyday’ challenge until I finish the rewrite of my first draft. I’ve had good weeks, and I’ve had better weeks, and the thing that helps keep me going is remembering my “why?”.

Why do I want to finish writing this book? What’s so special about this specific story?

I have multiple projects in the midst, but right now, The Bonai Chronicles has my undivided attention. I created the concept of The Bonai Chronicles when I was a sophomore in college. It started out as a Christian YA fantasy, illustrating a fantastical version of God’s people and their fight to be represented. My ideals have since changed and it’s transformed from it being a one-sided story into a reflection of my own personal spiritual journey about love, loss, church culture, and religious trauma. The characters hadn’t changed, in fact, they’ve become even more fleshed out and real to me.

My why had changed. And that’s okay. My hope for this story is for it to reach the readers that it needs to reach. I want people who are like me, who spent their formative years in a religion that breeded toxicity, to feel represented and to know that they aren’t alone.

And also, I want them to know that sometimes our enemies aren’t so black-and-white. Sometimes I am my own enemy. Sometimes it’s the leaders whom I’ve trusted. Sometimes it’s friends, or family, or whoever is different and didn’t have my best interest at heart. Life is messy and after spending so many years thinking it was cut out in black and white, I wanted to write about my colorful journey of discovering that it’s not.

That is my why. This book is for me, the younger me, and wishing I had something like this that explained my situation. To tell me not to ignore red flags and not to take those precious moments with the people I loved for granted. It’s a beautiful story because it’s my story.

So, what’s yours?