The other day I faced an obstacle in the publishing of my first book that nearly had me quitting on the project altogether.
While trying to get some endorsements from youth workers that I know and some I didn’t, I got back an email that hit me like a ton of bricks. It was from a representative of someone I was really hoping to get an endorsement from. The main reason was that I had actually used an acronym of theirs (with some slight adaptation) to use as a bounce-off point for my first 6 chapters. Getting this endorsement would be huge. What I did get was also huge, just not in a good way.
They essentially said that in order to move forward with publishing my book I would have to either change the acronym back to exactly how they had it and allow them to review the ENTIRE book, or cut it out completely. I couldn’t cut it out completely! And yet I didn’t like the other option either. And even though I thought about the possibility of fighting the copyright, I didn’t like that option either. It seemed to me like I’d clearly been put in a lose-lose situation.
That is, until it struck me.
A couple of hours of debating, thinking, reassessing, praying and then praying some more helped me realize that I could salvage the basic message of those chapters with just some slight adjustment. I’d just use a new acronym. It would mean I’d have to write an extra chapter to make it all work, but that could be done. But it gets even better!
This extra chapter would end up being on a topic that had somehow gone unmentioned in the book. And after realizing that, I couldn’t believe I would have released the book without talking about it! It was actually totally essential to the whole message of the book.
So, what had initially seemed like a major roadblock to what I wanted ended up getting me to what I really wanted. And that’s how God works so often in our lives.
We can be so certain that things need to go a certain way in order for us to get what’s “best.” But we don’t always know what “best” even is. In fact, the obstacles that come along the path that we’re traveling may be really be our biggest allies. They make us look twice at things. They get us to reassess where we’re at and where we’re going. We may even realize that we need to do a little rerouting.
Maybe it wasn’t the right relationship. Maybe there’s a better job coming. Maybe you’re going to learn a valuable lesson you wouldn’t have learned otherwise. Maybe that would have actually been bad for you in the long run. Maybe you’re being made it to a stronger, wiser, better, godlier person for having to go through this.
No one likes having to hit an obstacle and reroute. It’s inconveniencing. It can be heartbreaking. It can even make us want to throw in the towel. But I’m begging you, stay in the game just a bit longer. Don’t give up quite yet. You may eventually find that the obstacles you face have really been a blessing that got you to a much better place than you would’ve gotten to without them.