Many writers will say that to be a writer one must be insane.

We write because it gives a figurative voice to that insanity. We use words to chain it, to imprison it, sometimes to release it into the safety of the pages therein lest it consume us and those around us.

When successful, we sometimes forget we’re insane.

For a time.

But the little monster inevitably breaks its chains and takes surprising forms. Sometimes from the most unlikely and mundane of circumstances.

A fellow writer and friend offered to place some of my books at her table at a local event a few days ago. She just called me and said that even though she tried, no one was interested in buying my book.

So of course my insane little monster dug itself out of its prison and began whispering in my ear: “You spent all that money to publish a book and even bought over sixty copies which will now collect dust in the corner of a room until you die, and your surviving family will have to figure out what to do with them. Kindling, perhaps?”

I may be insane, but I’m also self-aware. I know that monster isn’t speaking truth. It is meant to sadden and depress. To discourage so I no longer work to get my words out there, even those in the form of a published book. To resign myself to the idea that my child or my husband will have to decide what to do with all those forgotten, useless words and forgotten, useless paper after I die.

Overly dramatic you say? Yep, but that’s the monster of insanity for you. When is it ever logical?

So how does one of the insane send its insanity back to where it belongs?

As we like to say in my bible study: Jesus is the answer.

God impressed upon me years ago that I am to be a writer, and I am to send my words out into the world. It stands to reason, then, that voice telling me to give up now isn’t coming from him.

Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. ~ James 4:7-8