Guest Blog for Canadian Bookworm
I'd like to welcome Lynda to the blog on the occasion of her first book which launched yesterday. Below she'll share with you the inspiration for the book and I'm including a link to the publisher site for more information. It seems very apt to do this on International Book Day. Pick up a book and celebrate.
Shonna
By Lynda Faye Schmidt
What Inspired Me to Write ‘The Healing.’
I’d been on a healing journey for more than twenty years before I’d acquired enough insight and wisdom to write The Healing.
In my early thirties, the challenge of being in an abusive relationship with someone who suffered with chronic depression had me desperate for a lifeline. I devoured self-help books, did an authenticity dig, and went for counselling as part of my survival kit.
Fast forward ten years and I was even deeper in the muck. Despite all the work I’d been doing, I was still in that relationship, but refusing to admit how toxic it was. I went into a deep, suicidal depression. It took a five-day stint in a mental health ward to kick things off in the right direction and over a year of intense therapy that included medication and counselling before I rediscovered the will to live.
Lucky for me, I had close relationships with my family and a fulfilling teaching career that kept my light burning even in the midst of escalating verbally and sexually abusive behaviours from my husband. I deepened my self-awareness and mindfulness practices, and it wasn’t long before I realized that I could never find what I was yearning for until I loved myself enough to leave him.
That’s when things took off in new and seemingly limitless directions, and where the story of The Healing begins.
I had always dreamed of being a writer someday, but life seemed to take me in different directions until I started to live a life that honoured and respected who I am. It is my belief that my true heart’s-desire to be a writer could never manifest as long I was living somebody else’s version of who and how I should be.
It didn’t happen overnight. It was a long journey to get here. I started scribbling poetry in the back of elementary school exercise books. Over the years, I’ve filled a massive pile of journals, written some children’s books for my kids, and drafted stories from snippets to full-length novels. I’ve received a pile of rejection letters. I had one disastrous quasi-publication experience with a shyster, but I never let go of my dream.
In 2012, I scratched out the first five pages of The Healing, then promptly forgot them amongst the distractions of health challenges and my move to the Middle East. I created my blog, Musings of an emotional creature. I was a contributor for DQ Living magazine. Then, I recovered those first five pages of The Healing and wrote my first draft. I shared my accomplishment with my friend Danielle, who gave me Anne O’Connell’s contact information. After a query and exchange, a Covid-19 lockdown and a total re-write, The Healing is ready to be launched in April of 2021.
My hope is that people will be inspired by The Healing to begin the work of discovering their own unique journey into wellness. Whatever their personal challenge, I hope that reading my book will encourage others to endure the lows and enjoy the highs, to trust the process of life, and to know, without question, that they matter. Whatever struggles life brings, they will pass. And it is in braving the struggle that we find our strength.
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