Persistence: Another four-letter word that isn’t

I ran across this quote a few days ago: The art of love … is largely in the art of persistence. Albert Ellis said it. And it is sticking in my mind, sticking to it in much the same way oatmeal sticks to your ribs. At first I thought of writing, how it is an act of love and how persistence is such a huge part of that love. I remember, vividly, painfully, the first time I was invited to join a critique group. They asked that I come to the meeting with a sample of my writing that I would be prepared to read out loud, in front of strangers. I worked hard and managed to produce one page of the novel I had in mind to write, that I thought might be fit to read, but when my turn came, my voice faltered. My mouth was so dry. I can’t imagine how I got through the ordeal. It was worse than the public speaking class I took in college where I was the only girl student in a roomful of guys. Who would want to endure that experience again? Much less week after week? Yet I did. I went back to the critique group and over time, I learned the craft of writing—through persistence. Was it me or was it the love for the art form, for the work itself, in me?

Then I extrapolated … what of my love for my children? How much of loving them was/is persistence? The moment they were settled into my arms after birth, I melted. I thought my heart would explode, I was in such awe, but then there were days. You know the ones. Those tests of love days. I would think: I am going to lose it here! I would go into the bathroom, shut the door and sit on the closed toilet lid and I would talk myself down, return to the fray, mete out whatever discipline was required. When everyone was calm again, we talked about what happened. It was an act of love, but wasn’t it also an act of persistence?

You fight with your spouse, you walk away and come back, talk it out. Isn’t that persistence? Love is like a visitor knocking on your door, persistently knocking until you open it and allow in the flood of inspiration, revelation, joy … the treasure that is there, that is inside you. We recognize that in each other and we persist in every way we can to connect with each other. We persist in loving one another, and our work, if we’re fortunate in that regard and often it is in the face of what seem to be insurmountable odds.

Oh, that single page of that novel?—the one I persisted through huge resistance to write? It’s titled The Last Innocent Hour and it’s free for one more day, today. I’d love it if you’d download it … read that first page, imagine a mouse squeaking out the words. I’m sure that’s how I sounded!