Having my name on something? AHHHHH!!!

You know that book, "If you give a mouse a cookie?"

And it's sequel, "If you give a moose a muffin?"

Personally, I like the moose one better, simply because I'm Canadian and I think having a moose in the house would be INSANE!!

Anyway, the concept follows the snowball principle of "what if..." and things get bigger and bigger and before you know it, holy freaking cow you're name is ON a website!!!!!!

And your picture. Which you took with your digital camera and tried not to look like you're stretching your arm waaaaaaaaay up.

And if you're Canadian, and of a certain age, you want to say "And I'll call Rusty")

And because I'm so ADD it hurts, I just stopped typing and uploaded a Youtube video to my Facebook page to share with my brother.

Okay,so back to my point.

My friends Becky Doughty and Heather Day and I got to talking about marriage and fiction, and how a freakishly high percentage of main characters in romantic fiction are young, hawt, un-marrieds with ripped pecs and perfect hair and that's just the girls.

Sooooooooo, what now?
What is our focus??

Becky graciously allowed me to share her blog post http://beckydoughty.com/2013/03/07/mentoring-or-enabling with you all. 

Why is this SO important to writers??

Because there are SO MANY WRITERS out there who float alone!!!

What is one way we can open the floodgates?  MENTORING!!

Mentoring is:

• Commending - promoting one another by openly speaking highly of each other.
• Entrusting - passing on important and pertinent information to those who can benefit from it.
• Teaching - clarifying what works and doesn't work to those who are still learning.
• Shepherding - being willing to lead, to steer those who are floundering or might get lost without direction.
• Willingly and eagerly exercising oversight - offering discernment when areas of weakness or strength are noted.
• Being examples - living in a way that Shows, not Tells - sorry, writer humor.
• In humility - never setting oneself above others, no matter what station in life, but always being gracious, putting others first.
• Guiding - offering help and encouragement to others who might be struggling to find their way.
• Sharing - not only the gospel, but of ourselves. Sharing our hearts - things we've learned along the journey.
• Training - Being willing to be an example of what has and has not worked, so that others can see more clearly how they should go.

These are just a few of the actions that make up mentoring, according to Scripture. Not one of the above verses mentions anything about allowing yourself to be used, to be walked on, to be beat up, to be taken advantage of, or abused in any other way. Not one of them says mentoring requires setting aside God's calling on your own life in order to hold someone up who isn't desirous of growing and learning and becoming a better wife, child, partner, writer, person. Not one of those verses confuse mentoring with enabling.

Mentoring is helping others find their own way, on their own two feet. Enabling is keeping others from finding their own way by lying down under their feet. On Married... With Fiction, it is our goal to build a community who reaches out to each other. Mentoring, not enabling.

Today, our Facebook Page, Married... With Fiction, is OPEN! Do join us over there - we'd LOVE to have you!