I Never Planned to Be an Author

I didn’t grow up thinking that I wanted to be an author. To help you understand why, I would have to explain a piece of my childhood.

I grew up believing that I wasn’t like everyone else. I struggled in school when it came to anything reading- or writing-based.

I remember teachers looking out over the class, trying to decide who they wanted to read aloud next. I remember trying everything to be invisible, praying that I wouldn’t be picked to read. I was a quiet, well-behaved child, which helped me slide under the radar most of the time.

When I did have those unlucky moments when I had to read aloud, I would panic! I would stare at a word and not know how to read it. You see, I memorized words, but I didn’t retain the process of sounding words out. To this day, reading can still be a struggle for me.

We moved a lot during my early childhood, which didn’t help my situation. Teachers didn’t have the opportunity to know me long enough to notice that I struggled with learning.

As I got older, I was labeled a daydreamer or lazy. I was just trying to survive day to day in school. I remember sitting at my kitchen table as a kid, staring at unfinished homework and feeling completely lost about where to start.

Along the way, I have had experiences that have taught me how to adjust to a world that isn’t always set up for me.

I now know that I am a hard worker. Things that are worth having in life do take hard work. When I was young, I thought that people were just born smart, and I wasn’t one of those people.

I remember hearing, as a parent, that we shouldn’t tell our children that they are smart because, by doing so, we may teach them that there are limits to what they can achieve. Instead, we should tell our children that they are hard workers.

For example, my son would come home and show me an “A” on a math test. Instead of saying, “Good job! You are so smart,” I could change my response to, “Wow, you must have worked hard to get that ‘A’!”

I listened to a book called Mindset by Carol S. Dweck. I enjoyed this book because it explained the theory behind not simply telling someone that they are smart, but instead emphasizing the effort they put into what they achieved.

After learning how to apply hard work to the things I wanted to accomplish, I found myself with a different mindset. That mindset prepared me for a moment I want to share with you.

When I sat in on a class where a book was being read aloud, when I was a Para for the school district. I found myself listening in a completely different way. I was no longer the child trying to be invisible when it was time to read. Instead, I was an adult who had learned that struggles don’t have to define what we are capable of accomplishing.

I guess when I sat in on a storytime in a classroom and listened to the book being read, I thought, This book has a great message.

I thought back to how my own story had helped me teach my daughter. I had thought about the story off and on over the years, but I realized that I could write it down and make it a resource for others.

I soon discovered that writing a book wasn’t going to be a quick process. I had to wrangle my pessimistic self many times. I would pick up the writing, only to put it back down again.

It took having an ACL replacement to finally devote myself to focusing on writing and finishing my book. As I was having a pity party for myself, lying in bed with a bandaged knee, I thought, “No excuses. I now have time to write my book.”

Was it hard to write a book? Yes.

But I can do hard things. We all can!