Welp, today was THE day. Years of dreaming, preparing, working, forgetting, and starting over came together with one push of a button today. I submitted my final manuscript to my publishing team and I nearly had a nervous breakdown before I mustered up the courage to actually do it! I told Maggie this morning that I was as nervous as a cat and she said,”Why Mama?”.

It took me a minute to figure out how to tell her why I was so nervous. I mean she knows that I’ve been writing a lot lately. She also knows about the book deal I signed. She has seen me cry, laugh, and stare off into space with my laptop sitting in my lap. She has asked me question after question about the book I’m writing, but through all of that she can’t understand in her nine year old brain why I would be so nervous to hit that button. As I sat there trying to figure out how to explain my nervousness to her I was able to get a clearer picture of all of this myself.

After a couple of minutes I looked her straight in the face and said, “Because the dream I had when I was your age is finally coming true”. She sat back in her seat and took a deep breath…then she looked at me and said, “It took you that long?!”.

Yes, as a matter of fact it did take me twenty-eight years to realize my dream of writing a complete book and sending it to a publisher one day. That’s a LONG time to wait for a dream to come true, but today when I hit that submit button it occurred to me that I had finally reached the place in my life where my dream was supposed to come true. All of those times before when I sat down and tried to write a book I would get two or three chapters in and it fell apart. I never had the whole story. Now…I do.

I glanced back over at my sweet daughter and smiled. She smiled back and in that moment I knew that I had just set a bar for her that will be there for the rest of her life. I had reached a goal that I set for myself a long, long time ago and I had clawed my way to this moment when I could finally say that “I did it!” Maggie’s smile let me know that she was proud of me. It also let me know that somewhere in there she has a dream she wants to accomplish one day too. She didn’t tell me what her dream was and I didn’t ask. Maybe one day she will share her dream with me…I hope she will.

Realizing my childhood dream today made me ride the roller coaster of emotions once again. Besides the nervousness, I felt scared…yet excited. I felt insecure…yet powerful. I felt lost…yet driven. The balancing act that I was attempting kept me cycling back and forth all morning. Once I sat down and looked at my finished book I told myself that I had dared to dream big…and I could stay home and keep it to myself…or I could hit that button and see how big my God really was. This book came from Him. This blog came from Him. This story that is being revealed to me day by day has been created by Him.

I glanced down at my wrist as I was typing and I read the word FAITH on two of my bracelets. It took a whole lot of faith for me to push that button, but once I did I felt a calmness and a sense of peace that I haven’t felt in quite some time. I am where I am supposed to be…doing what I am supposed to be doing…and it feels really GOOD!

I don’t have a clue what God is going to do with my story. I can’t even imagine how this whole thing will turn out. What I do know is that the one person I have allowed to read the finished product sat on my couch and cried this afternoon. When I asked her how the book made her feel she said the one word I had hoped to hear and had never mentioned to her at all. That’s a God thing….and it has made me more determined than ever to Dream Big, because I don’t want to stay home. One dream feeds another and if you allow yourself to remember what your childhood dreams were…maybe you can reach them quicker than I did. It really doesn’t matter how long it takes…what matters is that you step out on FAITH and allow God to use you like He wants too…that’s the key and everything else is gravy.

Today, I realized my big dream when I pushed that little button on my computer screen. I don’t care if not one more person reads my book. I don’t care if the editors tear it to pieces (OK, maybe I do care a little…I do have my pride involved here ya know). I don’t even care if I sell one copy, because my dream was to write a complete book and send it to a publisher. I never let myself dream about it actually getting published. Everything from this point forward is gravy…and I’m sure it’s got lumps in it….I’ve never made smooth gravy in my life! Good thing I was always taught to eat the gravy even with the lumps….God never tells us that we won’t struggle or get beat down. What He tells us is that His yoke is easy and His burden is light. I can testify to that truth today. Bring on the gravy, God!