I started graduate school in August and have been meeting many new people as a result. Just as I moved to Hawaii a couple months after I finished chemotherapy and found myself having to explain a lot of my back-story to the new faces I encountered, so now I find myself having to give a lot of context as to why things have been a bit busy…because I happened to write a book that also just happened to come out in the fall. People frequently ask me why I decided to write a book, and though I often doubted my reasons along the way—thinking there was a good chance I was legitimately going crazy—I’ve had two main reasons.
I was reminded of the first reason when I read something by Parker Palmer for one of my grad school classes. In his book Let Your Life Speak, Palmer explains his reasons for writing about his experience with depression, and I resonated with his words. Here’s what he says:
“…my depression was largely situational. I will tell the truth about it as far as I am able. But what is true for me is not necessarily true for others. I am not writing a prescription—I am simply telling my story. If it illumines your story, or the story of someone you care about, I will be grateful. If it helps you or someone you care about turn suffering into guidance for vocation, I will be more grateful still.”
That’s one of the main reasons why I wrote a book, and specifically a memoir. Time and again people have passed on names of friends or loved ones with cancer and asked me to help encourage them, and each time I’ve thought, “This is why I need to write—to help others who find themselves in these unexpected scenarios!” However, I know that my story is largely situational since there are so many different types of cancer, treatment plans, and outcomes. My story is not a prescription—though in telling my story I hope to offer up some tips that I learned along the way. But, if my story can be a communal experience with yours, if it can help you or someone you know with cancer, or even if it can encourage you—cancer or not—then I will be grateful.
The second—and most important—reason why I wrote is just what I said at the end of my introduction: that you get a glimpse of how God worked in my life and walk away encouraged at His sovereignty in all situations. The Bible verse that’s been framed on my wall beneath the words, “My Mission” for the past year is Psalm 145:4, which says, “One generation will commend Your works to another; they will tell of Your mighty acts.” Along with countless other verses in Psalms that talk about telling of God’s wonders in our lives, I was struck by this verse. Our job is to tell our stories, commending God’s works in our lives to other generations, telling of His mighty and faithful acts.
I was talking with a professor and his wife in December, and as I was sharing about my book, my professor identified it as a sort of “stewardship.” The next week after class, I asked him to explain that more because, while I know what stewardship means, the way he put it struck me. It was like he pinpointed what I had been trying to land on for a while. I definitely feel the responsibility to be a good steward with this. I’m not saying the fact that I’m alive and still in remission while so many others aren’t means my life is meant for something extraordinary, but I do have a sense that my health and story bear with them some sense of stewardship. One of the actual dictionary definitions of stewardship is: “the responsible overseeing and protection of something considered worth caring for and preserving.” I so appreciate my professor’s comment because I have that sense of needing to faithfully share my story and be a steward of what God has done in my life to tell the next generation of His mighty acts.
So, that is why I wrote a book: encouragement and stewardship. Thanks to everyone for your overwhelming support along the way and to everyone who has bought the book! May your February be warmer than mine and may 2014 be a wonderful year for y’all!
On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
Hannah