Hi there. You might have noticed a small (ha-ha) change on the website. I want to tell you all about why I did that, and what’s going to happen as we move forward.

For two or three years I’ve let this site languish as I struggled with what I was doing and what I wanted to do, and how that meshed with helping Christians in their daily walk. Or did it mesh? Or do I even have any business doing this THING that wasn’t necessarily a Christ-related thing at all?

What have I been doing? Well, as Mickey and I got more and more into pet birds and bird keeping and ALL THE THINGS, I started writing about them. There’s just so much incorrect information out there, I wanted to make sure people could get t heir hands on the right stuff. Because what you don’t know can kill your pet birds.

Now, if you’ve never had birds before you’ll be surprised to know that they interact with you every bit as much as dogs and cats. They have their own minds and boy do they make that clear! And you’d be even more surprised at how much you can love a bird. Because they’re (as the uneducated will tell you) “just a bird.”

But I digress.

My point is that I struggled with whether this was my calling or not, even as I kept doing it. I don’t believe in writer’s block but for this blog, I was blocked. I couldn’t bring myself to blog when I felt like I’d taken a wrong turn. And yet I couldn’t stop helping people with their pet birds.

Then I read two things that crystallized how it all fit. One was Brett McCracken in this article http://manofdepravity.com/2015/04/confronting-the-chaos/ which you totally have to read, right after this one. I’d read that ages ago but kept notes on it. His last sentence reads:

“In what way, however small it may seem, are you making this chaotic world a bit more orderly?”

About the same time I read a wonderful article about writing in more than one genre. Most people say stick with onnnnne topic. Boring! I can’t do it, square pegs round holes and so forth.

This article, and I’m so sorry I didn’t save it or even remember who wrote it – but it said even if you’re writing in 2 or 3 subjects there’s probably a common thread. Really? I couldn’t wait to investigate.

Well sure enough, I discovered the common thread, and I realized that yes, this is part of my calling. I see my mission in each of my topics (Bible studies, writing books, and keeping birds) is helping people make small changes that lead to big results. I see that I’m helping make the world just the teensiest bit more orderly. Wow!

Hence, changes.

So my next bird book comes out this month (The Gouldian Finch Handbook). I’m happily and energetically back to blogging, now I see that it’s not abandoning my faith, or my writing about faith, or my interest in helping writers write. Let’s just call it widening the horizon. And the website, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn will all get a much-needed revamp to sort of get them streamlined. New visuals and all that.

Be sure to let me know what you think!

Tags: birds

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