Dream Big, Dear Writer

by Susan Lyttek @SusanLyttek

Lately, I’ve been doing a series on my personal blog about Dreams and Memories and how God works in each of them to grow and develop us. When we dream and remember the way God would call us to, we become not only better Christians, but better writers.

Having taught many generations of beginning writers, I’ve noticed the tendency to dream big in the abstract, but to dream small in the practical. In other words, the first is, “Wouldn’t it be nice if I had written these different ideas on this grand scale?” Mentally, it’s more of a daydream or a wish. The second, dreaming small in something practical, might look like, “Based on my knowledge and training, I could write a blog about X.” When, in all actuality, that person could write an essay at the very least and possibly a book.

On the dreams they hunger after, they allow themselves to have dismissive dreams. Dreams about what might happen if they were good enough. On the dreams where they know they’re good enough, they imagine doing something small successfully.

In other words, most writers underestimate themselves.

And in so doing, they underestimate the God they serve.

I definitely count myself among the numbers of small dreamers. Over the last two years, my YA series, the Portal Watchers has been released. Thanks in no small part to small dreaming, that nearly didn’t happen. As it was, it took over twenty years from idea to print. Every time I would work on it, it seemed too big for me. It seemed like something a best-selling author should write.

But prayer and some solid writing friends reminded me that this story was mine because of how God made me. I needed to keep my focus heavenward and reign in the doubt that kept me stymied.

C.S. Lewis said. “Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither.” When we dream small and set our sights low, we lose out on potential blessings of earth and heaven.

This does not mean that writers should write everything and anything and put it out there without editing or vetting. Diligence to craft is still essential.

Abundant living, abundant dreaming means you align your thoughts, dreams, and purposes with those of God. When writers do that, he pours new ideas back in. In the book of Malachi, God mentions the response to the physical tithe, as uncontainable abundance. ¹⁰ Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it. (Malachi 3: 10, NIV) In a similar tone, Paul tells us in Romans to become living sacrifices. Why? Because God will use us to pour mercy on the world and knit the body of Christ together.

God’s abundance has no earthly limits. If we look to him to guide our writing dreams, if we look to heaven and his kingdom as our motivation, our dreams will grow. No longer will we be content with merely impacting the here and now; though, the change in us will change the present, too.

What abundant dream, what epic story has God been whispering to your soul? What idea thrills you every time it surfaces (and before the enemy shoots it down as ridiculous)?

Accept it. Walk into it. And trust that God is big enough to make it real.

When Susan Lyttek was a teen, she wanted to be an oceanographer, then an archaeologist, then a fashion designer, then a spy, then a foreign diplomat. It’s a good thing God called her to become a writer since she can make her characters do whatever interests her in the moment!