This morning I was going to get up early and go to the gym. I didn’t.

After the gym I was going to go to my fave café and get my marking out of the way so that I could spend the afternoon writing. I didn’t.

What did I do this morning?

I slept in until after 10am (which rarely happens) & I lay in bed scrolling through Instagram on my phone.

Truth is that this is what my body & mind needed this morning. Rest and recovery. So I’m not going to beat myself up over skipping the gym and letting my marking sit in my backpack for a little longer.

But while scrolling through Instragram I came across the above post by Glennon Doyle Melton (@glennondoylemelton), founder of Momastery and author of #1 New York Times Bestseller LOVE WARRIOR, a memoir of her journey of self-discover following the implosion of her marriage. It’s an honest & inspirational account of confronting pain and claiming love. I highly recommend it. (So does Oprah!)

Faith & Sweat

Glennon’s post struck me this morning because it reveals how important it is to MAKE TIME to pursue our passions. Even bestselling authors like Glennon struggle to prioritize their writing.  As a mother of three children, Glennon struggled to find time to write amidst her family responsibilities. So she gets up before her family is awake to make it happen. Even if this means dragging herself out of bed when she wants the extra sleep. Her memoir, Love Warrior, is the product of her getting up at 4:30am so that she could MAKE TIME for writing.

As an aspiring writer myself, I’ve been finding myself resenting the various responsibilities that encroach on my time to write.

I’m a full-time teacher during the week, so in order to meet professional standards, as well as my own personal standards for myself (which are arguably too high sometimes), I need to spend time in the evening and weekends to get marking done, and prepare my lessons. It is not fair of me to resent my job or even my students because these tasks take time away from writing.

Teaching also allows me to pay the bills and contribute to society in a meaningful way. As of now, writing is not paying the bills. So as much as writing fuels my heart, it is not fuelling my very hearty appetite. It is not paying my rent. It is not paying utilities. It is not paying for the splurge on the blue cowboy boots I bought in Arizona.

Still, writing fuels my soul and makes me feel happy in a way that nothing else can. Not a person. Not an adventure. Not an experience. It is really hard to explain what writing does for me. I guess it is when I feel most like myself.

Before I wrote my first novel, See What Flowers, (which is yet to be published and maybe never will), I had the same attitude as “S”, the aspiring writer Glennon refers to in her Instagram post. I thought “One day when I have enough money, I will write. One day, when I have enough time, I will write. One day, when I am good enough to do it, I will write. One day, when I have a good enough idea, I will write.” But somehow the desire to write overcame the excuses not to and I made the time.

Having saved up a lot of money from living in the Arctic and having the privilege to live with family and not pay rent, I took 10 months off of teaching to write.

The process of writing a novel that hasn’t been published taught me how important it is for me to make time for writing in my life. Regardless of whether my novel gets published, or regardless of whether or not anyone else thinks my writing is any good…writing adds meaning and value to my life in a way that nothing else can.

I likely will never be a bestselling writer like Glennon Doyle Melton. But I certainly won’t if I don’t “SWEAT”: if I don’t make time to work on the craft. I can’t get the beach body by skipping the gym every morning…

I also won’t make time for writing if I don’t have FAITH. I need to believe that I am deserving of making time to devote to my craft.

Maybe this novel won’t be published. Maybe the next one that is yet to be started won’t be either. But for me, the process of writing is enough to justify making the time to do it, even if this means early mornings, Saturday nights in, and allowing my marking to pile up every now and then.

The next book won’t be written “one day.” The next article won’t be written “one day.” The dream won’t happen “one day.”

But it doesn’t have to happen all at once either. It will happen bit by bit, by carving out some time each day, and with a lot of faith & sweat.

This means setting boundaries on other responsibilities, setting limits on how much I do for other people, and putting myself and my own dreams & desires first sometimes.

Time to hit the gym.