We once recorded an episode called When to Quit Writing. Sometimes quitting is the right move, because to say “yes” to something good, you often have to say “no” to other things. In every yes, there’s an embedded no. For example, when I choose to spend time with my family, I choose not to spend time doing anything else.

Writing is not always the best use of your time. Our time is limited.

I think every author should listen to that episode twice; once right now and once when they’re trying to decide whether to quit. You can feel good about your decision to quit if you’re doing it on purpose.

But we didn’t discuss what to do when you know you can’t quit. You know you must keep writing, but you’re discouraged. Maybe you feel God has called you to write, but the work is hard, and you find yourself dragging your feet. Perhaps it’s been years, and success still seems out of sight.

How do you keep writing when you’re broke, rejected, and exhausted?

I asked Briah Hicks, founder of the Motivated Author, a community specifically for authors who need help staying in the fight. He has spent decades studying what separates people who push through from people who give up.

What are the most common killers of motivation for writers?

Thomas: Every author struggles with motivation at some point. In your experience working with writers, what are the most common things that kill motivation?

Brian: Writing is very solitary. No one’s telling you to get off the couch, so you have to motivate yourself. In the beginning, you’re excited about your great idea that’s going to set the world on fire. Maybe you’ve prayed it through, and you feel God is calling you to write this story. Then you hit what we call the muddle, the middle of the novel.

You’re 30,000 words in, fully invested, and suddenly there’s a plot hole you didn’t see. Maybe you started with an outline, but a character or conversation pulled you in a different direction. Now, you’re stuck, and you think, “If God called me to this, shouldn’t it be easier?”

That thought might be a Western cultural thing, but it’s the furthest thing from the truth.

If God called you to do something, it’s probably not going to feel easy. We buy into lies because we have an enemy who seeks to steal, kill, and destroy. When we hit that muddle, that’s what I call our Genesis three moment. We started out excited, saying, “This is what God called me to do.” Then halfway through it gets tough, and we hear, “Did God really say you’re supposed to write this story?” And we think, “I thought he did. Maybe. I don’t know.”

We overlook the fact that we have a real enemy. Stephen Pressfield in The War of Art calls it “resistance.” As Christians, we know resistance goes by a different name. It’s very real, and it’s very good at whispering, “Did God really say?” We get in our own heads. That’s where the problems start. But the question is, how do you respond to that Genesis three moment?

How do you respond to the “resistance?”

Thomas: Sloth is one of the deadly sins, and that “resistance” could be the enemy whispering, “Did God really say?” But often it’s just our own flesh saying, “Let’s sleep in,” wrapped in theological language like, “I don’t want to grind. I don’t want to hustle.”

You have been cursed. Not by a witch, but by almighty God, to grind, to sweat, and to labor. This is a curse from the maker of the universe for our sins. Working is not a bad thing, but it is a required thing.

Another area where laziness speaks to us is through the lie that God speaks through open doors. I’m not convinced there is any scriptural support for that. In fact, there’s a lot of scriptural support against it. God opened a door for Paul in Troas, and Paul didn’t go through it because he didn’t have peace about it since Titus wasn’t with him.

Often God calls people to do something, and there’s a closed door in front of them. Part of the call is opening the door. The gates of Jericho were not open. The giants in the promised land didn’t die from a plague; the children of Israel had to go in and kill them.

I have a conspiracy theory that the doctrine of “open doors” came from the managerial state, which has infected the church. Who speaks through open doors? Managers, bosses, corporations, overlords. They often close doors that God wants you to go through.

As a Christian, your goal is to obey God, who is perfectly capable of speaking to you directly through the Bible. Obey God and don’t pay attention to the doors. That’s not how God speaks. He could if he wanted to, but why would he when he can speak to you directly or through the scriptures?

Whether you believe God speaks today or not, we all agree he speaks through the scriptures. He’s God. He can speak through a donkey. But I don’t see him opening a door for Noah; I see him calling Noah to 120 years of hard work. I don’t see him opening a door for Elijah; I see him calling Elijah to hard work.

Often that work is difficult, and sometimes you’re not even successful. After Elijah preached and got rid of all the prophets of Baal, they still didn’t get a righteous king. That’s okay. He’s still one of the greatest prophets Israel ever had.

What is the Van Gogh dilemma?

Brian: In the Motivated Author community this past month, I talked about “The Van Gogh Dilemma.” Most people hear Vincent van Gogh’s name and think of his painting Starry Night and that he cut off his ear. That’s about it.

Most people don’t know that van Gogh’s father was a minister. I come from a long line of preachers myself, so I feel a connection with him.

He went to seminary and flunked out, so he became a missionary in the coal mining regions of Belgium, where they called him the Christ of the coal mines. He gave away everything, literally the shirt off his back. The church got upset about that, pulled the plug, and booted him.

At 27, he’d tried several things and hadn’t found his place. Then he picked up a paintbrush, and the rest is history.

Here’s what most people still don’t know. From age 27 to 37, he created 2,100 works of art. I published two books in 13 years. In 10 years, van Gogh produced 2,100 works, and in his lifetime, he sold one painting. One.

What if God’s calling us to a van Gogh scenario? I pray it’s not the case, but it might be.

Van Gogh wrote to his brother, and I’m paraphrasing, “I paint. That’s what God called me to do.” He had a mental illness and other challenges. It was very hard, but he hung in there for 10 years and produced all this art, and nobody knew. Today, his catalog is worth billions. A single painting goes for over $100 million.

But many of us think that if we’re going to do this, we have to see success at the end. Define success. If we see it, we feel like God’s opening a door. That’s not supported biblically. Read Hebrews. For most of the early heroes of the faith, it didn’t end well from an earthly standpoint.

I aspire to be like the Apostle Paul. He was prolific, but he didn’t know he was writing the New Testament. He was simply writing letters to churches. There was no New Testament. He had no clue. In fact, he was in jail, but God called him to deliver a message. He’s a preacher and teacher who can’t get to the audience, so he writes a letter and gets it to them that way.

We should ask ourselves: If we’re called, do we let circumstances stop us? Paul was in jail and didn’t stop. Van Gogh sold one painting and didn’t stop. The doors may be closed, but that’s not why we do what we do. We do it because we can’t not write it.

What is the ultimate motivation hack for Christian writers?

Brian: Ephesians 2:10 says, “We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” If God has prepared good works in advance for you, then your motivation is simple: I’m doing the good works God called me to do. Our motivation can’t be a bestseller status, fame, or money, although those things may happen. Our motivation must be, “I’m doing this because God called me to do it.”

I talk out of both sides of my mouth on this. If you’re called to write, good news, you’re not digging ditches. Bad news, you’re called to write, and writing is definitely a grind.

It also means surrendering the story to God. Maybe friends or your spouse say, “You’d be really good at writing these kinds of stories.” But you’ve got this story God’s given you, and it won’t let you go. It may not be writing to the market. You might not even know what genre it fits. All the odds are stacked against it, but you write it because you can’t not write it.

How does God’s accountability change our approach to writing?

Brian: There’s an accountability piece here that we miss. I grew up a preacher’s kid. My great-granddaddy, my granddaddy, my dad, and my uncle were all preachers. I went into health insurance and employee benefits, and my brother went into credit cards, so I’m pretty sure there’s a joke about us undoing all the good of the generations before us.

I’ve heard Ephesians 2:10 my entire life, but a few months ago, our pastor referenced it almost as a throwaway line, and the Holy Spirit just hit me.

I was also listening to Living Fearless by Jamie Winship. He talks about God’s accountability. In addiction recovery groups, you go to the meeting, and they ask, “Did you do the thing last week?” You either tell the truth and feel bad or lie and feel bad. Either way, they say, “Don’t do it this week, and we’ll see you next Tuesday.” What kind of accountability is that?

Here’s God’s accountability: “How do you have time for that bad habit or sin when I’ve got all these good works I planned in advance for you to do?” You may not have an addiction in the traditional sense, but how much time do you spend scrolling?

When I heard that question alongside Ephesians 2:10, it scared me. God has prepared all these things for us to do, and I’ve not been nearly as prolific as I should be.

In the movie Hope Floats, Gena Rowlands plays the mom arguing with her daughter Birdie, played by Sandra Bullock. She says, “You think every chance, there’s another one and another one and another one. It’s the worst kind of extravagance, the way you spend your chances.” I wish I had written that line.

God’s got good works planned for me. For me, that means writing. His accountability is, “How do you have time for all this other stuff, even the ‘good’ stuff? You keep wasting your chances, and one day there won’t be another one.”

Brian Tracy, the great sales trainer, often said, “What kind of sales team would my team be if everyone on it was just like me?”

Here’s my axiom, paraphrasing Tracy: how fruitful would the Apostle Paul be if he were just like me? That’s sobering. How many good works has God put in front of us that we haven’t stepped into? Maybe we were lazy. Maybe we fell for the lie that some other opportunity made more sense, like a promotion with more responsibility. But have you considered that might take away from the good works God has for you?

That is the ultimate hack. My motivation is that one day I’m going to stand before the creator of the universe and he’s going to say, “I had these good works for you.” I cannot stand in front of him and say, “I was going to write that book, God, but it was kind of hard.”

What does giving an account look like for Christian authors?

Thomas: We give an account for every deed done in the body, whether good or evil (see 2 Corinthians 5:10). That’s a scary passage because it’s the judgment seat of Christ judging Christians, not the Great White Throne judgment separating the sheep from the goats.

Taking on more responsibility at work and guiding the direction of an organization may be exactly what God wants you to do. We’re not elevating writing. Writing may be the distraction. That’s why I opened with the “When to Quit” episode.

For a lot of authors, God called you to write a book because he wanted to do a work in your heart, not because he wanted you to become a published author. The call to one thing doesn’t necessitate the call to the other.

My ultimate hack is simpler: delete TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram from your phone. They’re not good for marketing, mental health, or spiritual development. Open the screen time app, and you’ll see all the time you needed to be a productive writer right there.

Instead, install Just Press Record. It’s a $7.00 app that transcribes your dictation. I have a Patron Toolbox tool called the Chapterizer that adds punctuation, inserts paragraphs, corrects homophones, and provides a clean rough draft. No more excuses.

Why is starting with a novel a terrible mistake?

Thomas: Another reason we get discouraged is that we feel a big call and jump straight into the big thing. That’s almost never how it works. There’s a biblical principle of first being faithful with little things.

Paul was called to be an apostle. First, he preaches to people in his hometown right after getting saved. Then he goes into the wilderness for years while God works on his character and understanding of truth. He serves in obscurity for years before becoming Paul the church planter, and years more before becoming Paul the epistle writer.

St. Patrick gets captured as a slave in Ireland, learns Irish, and receives a call from God to bring the gospel to the Irish. He escapes, goes back to Britain, and serves as a local pastor for about 40 years, gaining spiritual, emotional, and physical maturity. Only then, as a bishop, does he return to Ireland with authority, perform miracles, and convert the whole country.

For authors, the pattern holds. Authors get excited, and the very first thing they do is start writing a novel. That’s a terrible, career-ending mistake. You’re not ready for your novel yet, and you’re especially not ready for that magnum opus that’s been on your heart for 40 years.

You need to get good at writing first, and you don’t get good quickly by writing a novel. It’s impossible to get feedback on 100,000 words. Revisions are difficult. It’s big and unwieldy.

In my Five Year Plan course for authors, our students read a book on craft every month and then write a short story based on what they’ve learned. They’re being faithful in the little things, learning how to open a story, write the middle, and write the closing.

Some authors say, “I don’t like short stories.” But I would answer, “Do you like being good at writing? You’re not writing short stories to sell. You’re writing them to get good at writing.”

When I was a young swimmer, our swim team was nearly undefeated year after year because our coaches had us do drills, just working on our right arm, then just kicking. We rarely actually swam. The only day we really swam was Fridays before Saturday meets. But through the magic of training, our kicking was slightly faster than the other kids’ because they were doing the whole stroke the whole time.

You’ll improve faster by writing short stories. Feedback is easier, cheaper, and you learn how to end a story. A lot of authors have been writing for five years and never written an ending because they keep adding sequels. They have no idea how to end a story, and they leave readers unhappy.

Why is “simple” not the same as “easy”?

Brian: The biblical principle is to be faithful in the small things, and you’ll be given more.

These are simple things, but simple doesn’t always mean easy. We trick ourselves into thinking, “That’s so simple, it must be easy,” and so we skip the short story.

I’ve heard you say numerous times, “Don’t publish your first novel.” It’s one of your 10 commandments: thou shalt not publish thy first novel first. My mea culpa is that I did. I needed a book for the back of the room when I was speaking. At the time, I hadn’t heard your podcasts yet, and I wasn’t a patron.

I would never release that book today. I’m revising it now because I plan to rerelease it, but it needs work. Imagine if I’d taken your advice and done some smaller things first.

One thing that was extremely helpful was that I was a columnist for an industry magazine on employee benefits. I was the hype man for the salespeople, writing motivational stuff. Working with an editor, deadlines, and a word count taught me how to communicate an idea. You may have noticed I can use all the words. I do not have a problem using all the words. But writing for a publication like that prevents you from using all the words. You have to find the best words.

Those little things make you better, sometimes without you even knowing it. I don’t think there are many first-time-out-of-the-gate successes. I don’t even know if J.K. Rowling qualifies. For the most part, people have been writing a long time before they succeed.

Why shouldn’t you publish your first book first?

Thomas: Very often, you find what’s called a trunk book, or two, or five, that an author wrote and didn’t publish. My actual commandment is “Thou shalt not publish thine first book first.” Publish a different book first, then look back with clear eyes at the first manuscript you wrote, and if it truly is a masterpiece, publish it later.

Almost everyone who follows this commandment has the same experience. After writing and publishing their second book, their eyes open. They look at that work they thought was a masterpiece, and they only see flaws. After seeing it clearly, they can make it better, and they haven’t ruined that first impression on readers by publishing a bad first book.

In traditional publishing, your first impression defines your career. If your first book doesn’t sell well, your career is basically over.

In indie publishing, you’re not as stuck, but a weak debut can still get you off on the wrong foot. When your “first book” is a hit, everything gets easier because you’ll have money for advertising and hiring. Money greases the wheels in this business and lets you delegate your weaknesses.

How do you handle a discouraging critique?

Thomas: Certain moments in our careers invite discouragement more than others. Right after a successful Kickstarter, you’re not typically discouraged, but you might be after you get your first critique.

You ask for feedback, get a harsh critique, and know deep down it’s true. That’s the critique that really hurts. Maybe someone told you, “Your characters aren’t well developed.” You look back at your manuscript and realize they’re not, but now you have 100,000 words to revise.

You’re much better off if you learn to develop characters by writing short stories.

If you do have to rewrite the whole thing, it’s easy to get discouraged. Whether critique is delivered in a nice way or not, it still hurts.

What advice would you give somebody who received rough, red-stained feedback?

Brian: First, if I’m doing this because God called me to it, I want the best possible result. We’re told to do our work as if doing it for the Lord (see Colossians 2:23). As we discussed, Ephesians 2:10 says we are doing it for the Lord because he planned it for us.

Sometimes it’s painful to make it the best it can be.

It’s also important to separate yourself from your characters. I know you love them, but a trustworthy critique partner is genuinely trying to help you make it better. A professional editor understands that. Sometimes you need tough love to make your book the best it can be.

I tell my early readers, “I don’t want to embarrass myself and my family. Be brutally honest.” I even ask, “Was there a point where you put it down and thought, ‘I don’t really have to pick this back up, but I will because Brian asked me to’?” I need to know where that was.

Thomas: Once you find that spot, listen to my episode on tension. Never give the reader a good place to put it down where they don’t want to pick it back up.

A great question to ask your readers is, “Mark when you stopped. When was the end of each reading session?”

Brian: A friend told me, “I’m reading your book for about 30 minutes at a time in the morning.” I thought, “I think I just got my feedback.” If he could put it down after 30 minutes, this might not have been the story for him.

What I want is what another friend described: “I made a mistake starting your book the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving. I was dying all day because we had family over and I didn’t want to be rude, but I was dying to know what happened next.”

That’s the response you want. If you want to be a professional, you’re going to hear hard stuff. But it’s iron sharpening iron. It makes you better.

How can reframing critique protect you from public criticism?

Thomas: Reframe critique this way: this person is guarding me from two- and three-star reviews on Amazon. Private feedback is far better than a scathing two-star review you can’t take down.

I have an episode on taking down negative reviews, because the really bad ones often break Amazon’s rules. One-star reviews are actually good for your book’s credibility. They come from angry people and actually boost sales. There’s a lot of research on this. One-star reviews are your friends. Two- and three-star reviews hurt sales because they’re closer to the mark.

I built a Patron Toolbox tool called the Roast Engine that reads your manuscript and roasts it. I created a bunch of trolls that leave scathing reviews on your book. They’ll never like it. They’ll always find something to criticize, but it previews the negative feedback you’ll get. It’s a surprisingly popular tool. It’s not sycophantic at all.

How does humility help?

Thomas: It’s also helpful to not overspiritualize things.

You may feel called, but writing is also a job. You’re doing it to feed your family, and that’s good and noble. Paul says if you aren’t providing for your family, you’re worse than an unbeliever.

Other people dig ditches, which is in some ways more noble than writing. The apostle Paul says to make it your ambition to work with your hands (see 1 Thessalonians 4:11). As an author, you’re not working with your hands. The typing isn’t the labor. The guy digging ditches is doing the real, more noble work.

We tend to heap ourselves with unearned glory because we think writing is so noble and righteous, as we’re sitting in an air-conditioned room all day. Your book may be good, but that ditch will keep somebody’s house from flooding or a kid from drowning. Don’t think you’re so great.

A little humility goes a long way. If we don’t take ourselves or our work so seriously, criticism is easier to hear.

How should writers handle rejection?

Thomas: Rejection is different from critique because it comes with consequences.

• This publishing house will never accept this book.
• This agent doesn’t want you.

That’s where the thought creeps in, “Maybe God is speaking through this literary agent that I shouldn’t be published.”

God can talk to you himself. He wrote the Bible. Don’t give prophetic authority to a literary agent or acquisitions editor who may not have even read your manuscript. There are a million reasons for rejection that have nothing to do with your writing.

This agent may not be acquiring white men because no publishing houses will sign one right now. They saw you’re a white man and wrote you off. Does that mean you’re not called to write? No. You may have to tear down the gates of Jericho. You’re called to be obedient and do the work regardless.

Sometimes rejection does mean something’s wrong with your writing. It doesn’t always mean “just keep trying.” Sometimes it means this agent saved you from embarrassing yourself because you were submitting the first book you ever wrote. Don’t publish your first book first.

The traditional publishing version of that is “Don’t submit your first book to a literary agent.” Write it, set it aside, and then write another with all the new skills you developed. That book will be better and set you up for career-long success.

How do you prepare for rejection as a writer?

Brian: This is where my long history in commission sales comes in. In the world I’ve inhabited for three and a half decades, there’s no base salary. You don’t sell, you don’t eat. It’s employee benefits, business-to-business. We’re not the shady, greasy-haired stereotype. We’d like to think we’re a better class of loser. But if you don’t go to work, you don’t make a sale. If you’re not any good when you sit down in front of someone, you don’t eat.

I have a framework I call your rejection reaction. Rejection is part of the game. Not everyone is as excited about your hopes and dreams as you are. Not everyone will say yes. You have to separate yourself from the work.

In sales, you have to say, “Maybe my presentation wasn’t clean enough. Maybe I didn’t listen well enough.” In writing, you have to say, “Maybe I missed something, whether it’s character development or genre.”

Thomas: They’ll never say they’re not publishing white men. They’ll say “it’s your platform” instead. That’s the industry euphemism, because saying it outright is straight-up discrimination. There are laws against it. But usually, they’ll find some legally circumspect version of rejecting you for being a white man.

Brian: A lot of rejection comes down to timing. If you understand that, you can say, “This isn’t about me. It’s about timing.”

We also leave room to accept that the story might need work. Professionals understand that rejection doesn’t mean, “I wasn’t called to do this.” It may be timing or that the work wasn’t ready.

New salespeople would come back to me and say, “I did the thing. I said exactly what you told me. I don’t know what went wrong.” We’d record them running through it and immediately see the problem. They were so excited to get it all out that they never asked questions. They never found out what the prospect needed. They just threw four things out there hoping one would stick. Then they’d hear the playback and say, “I didn’t realize I did that.” Faithful in the little things. Start small, learn, get better. That helps with the rejection reaction.

How does toxic positivity hurt authors?

Thomas: Many authors are dying from toxic positivity. They hear encouraging things with no substance. Encouragement without substance is flattery, and flattery is the path to destruction.

The king gets flattered about how powerful his army is and goes to war. The other king has been hearing harsh criticism and working to make his troops better. Who wins? The kingdom that values truth, not feelings.

Sometimes you have to get rejected to hear the truth. It’s difficult to hear the truth about your book in this industry. If you’re indie published, you’re paying everyone, and they all have a financial incentive for you to keep going, whether you’re any good or not. Everyone says, “Keep going. You’re doing great. Let me design more covers. Let me edit your next book.”

That’s one advantage of traditional publishing. An agent only says yes if they believe your writing has value. The rejection may not mean anything, but the acceptance does, if it’s a real agent or real publishing house.

Thomas: This industry is a power law business, not a standard distribution where most people do average. The top two percent of authors make more than the bottom 50 percent. The top 10 percent make all of the money. The single top author often makes more than 50 percent of all the authors combined, depending on genre.

To sell a lot of copies, which is most people’s definition of success, even if they won’t admit it, you have to be number one or number two. The number three person sold 10 copies last month in some genres. Christian fantasy is like that. Only three or four authors are making any money because there aren’t many readers. Everyone wants to write fantasy, but they’re not buying other authors’ fantasy books. There’s no hardcore readership.

Christian thriller, on the other hand, has lots of readers and far fewer authors. Much easier if you’re trying to feed your family. Adapt to the genre. Give people what they want. Serve your reader. See your reader as your boss, not your servant.

It’s hard. We say, “I don’t want to do marketing. I just want to write this beautiful story God gave me.” Stop talking about yourself. Get over yourself. Take the low road. There’s more money there and more blessing for other people. If you humble yourself, God will exalt you.

What can cold calling teach us about writing?

Brian: I was training a lady one time in Alabama, and it was pouring rain. We had to make cold calls, which means walking into businesses cold, not knowing anybody, and saying, “Who handles your employee benefits? I’d like to talk to them.” They’ll probably tell you that person’s not there, even though they might be standing at the desk.

It’s pouring rain, and she says, “Brian, I can’t cold call in the rain. It makes you look desperate.” I said, “Yes, ma’am, but what if you are?”

Sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

I’m still learning marketing. I’m not the best, but I recognize I have to do it. In my day job, after three and a half decades, I don’t think twice. I know what to do, when, how, who to talk to, and what to say. You can’t surprise me.

But marketing my writing? Talk about humbling yourself. You believe in this story and want to get it in front of people, but there’s a whole lot you don’t know. You’re going to make mistakes. It’s going to be embarrassing sometimes. That’s what you sign up for.

Ho can writers rediscover their motivation?

Brian: Commission sales is a brutal career. There is no base salary, and it’s not for everybody, but I can’t look at you and know that. The only way to find out is to try it. The problem is a very high washout rate in sales. To build a team of salespeople without steady paychecks, you have to figure out what makes people quit.

Someone will argue, “What makes people quit is that they’re not making money.” Fair enough. But something happens between starting and not making money. If you’re not making money, it’s because you’re not doing the work.

It’s like the farmer who goes out to his field every day, looks at the ground, and says, “I need some corn.” Then he goes back inside. After several weeks, he looks at his neighbor’s field and sees tall corn. It’s easy to spot because his own field is just dirt.

Finally, on his hands and knees, he says to the ground, “I need some corn,” and the ground says, “Don’t bring me your need. Bring me some seed. Bring the seed, and I promise you’ll get corn.”

You’ve got to put the work in.

So we asked, “What makes them stop doing the work?” Every time, they’d lost sight of the opportunity. They let rejection get to them and reacted poorly to critique. Then the Genesis three moment comes: “Are you sure about this? I don’t know if this is for you.” Then we’d lose them.

When you recognize the opportunity and refuse to lose sight of it, that’s the key. That’s why I started the Motivated Author community. Zig Ziglar got challenged on motivation once. Someone said, “The problem with motivation is it doesn’t last.” He said, “You’re right. Neither does bathing, which is why we recommend you do it every day.”

How do you keep going?

Brian: How do you keep the opportunity in front of you? You’ve got to be reminded. My dad quoted a passage from Leviticus at our wedding.

I married my high school sweetheart 33 years ago. At our wedding, my dad, the preacher, gave the charge to the couple. Good Southern Baptists have a three-point charge to the couple. I’m half listening because I’m gazing at my bride, and out of nowhere I hear him say something about Leviticus. I was like a cow looking at a new gate, thinking, “I thought you were going to talk about Corinthians.”

In Leviticus 6:13, God says to Moses and Aaron about the altar and burnt offerings, “Keep the fire burning on the altar always, and never let it go out.” My dad said, “That’s the key for your marriage. Tend the flame.” The Brian Hicks translation: if you get up in the middle of the night, you better put some wood on it.

That’s good advice for us because we live in a set-it-and-forget-it world. Irrigation systems run all spring and summer without a thought. We don’t tend the yard like we once did.

We even have gas logs with a light switch on the side of the fireplace. Flip a switch, and it lights up. We don’t tend flames anymore.

The problem is, we think we can do everything in life that way.

Here’s my cheesy motivational speaker phrase of the day: There are no gas logs in your heart.

If your fire has gone out, ask why. Usually, it’s because you’ve lost sight of the opportunity to write stories that impact people.

A guy came up to me at church a couple of weeks ago and said, “I just want to shake the hand of my new favorite author.” I said, “You’re my new favorite guy.” He said, “I read that part where the girl says that thing about Jesus, and I got chill bumps.” When he told me that, I got chill bumps.

How does comparison affect writers?

Thomas: The final thing that discourages authors is comparison. You look at your success, then at another author’s, and envy grows in your heart.

Of all the sins we face as a society, envy is the biggest. It powers communism. It powers socialism. “Why can’t I have what they have?”

Envy is especially poisonous in power law industries. The number two author in a genre might be making 20 times less than number one. That’s the difference between five people at your book signing and 100 at theirs.

At every Novel Marketing Conference, at least one author is quietly making five digits a month, sometimes seven digits a year. They’ll privately tell me, “I’m number one in such and such genre, making $15,000 a month.” Usually, it’s an off-the-beaten-path genre, and being number one is where the money is.

They’re terrified to share numbers because they know how poisonous envy is. Suddenly, nobody wants to be their friend, or everyone does in a shallow, flattering way. “Can you give me money? Can you give me advice?”

Envy and comparison are very un-Christian. Jesus shares a parable about this. Day labor was common in the first century, and Jesus may have done it himself. Men would gather in one area and employers would hire from that spot.

The field owner hires laborers first thing in the morning and comes back a couple of hours later to hire more workers. He keeps coming back to hire people, and finally hires a group late in the afternoon. Each time, he agrees to pay a day’s wage, one denarius.

At quitting time, he pays them all the same denarius. The guys who had worked since early morning say, “This isn’t fair.”

Do they get praised for pointing out the inequality? No. That’s not what Christians do. The master says, “You agreed to a day’s wage. If I want to pay somebody else more, that’s between us.”

This is a hard saying. Communism is a false religion. It’s not just a flawed economic model. It’s anti-Christian and anti-Christ, top to bottom. It’s about taking, not giving. Repent from it and embrace humility and hard work.

Looking at somebody and learning from them is fine. If the lesson is “I need to work hard like that farmer,” good. But envy is a deadly sin. At best, it kills you. At worst, it kills your family and your country.

We must repent from envy and do the hard work, even if we never get paid as much as the other guy. “I worked all day for one denarius. He worked two hours for the same amount. It’s not fair.” It doesn’t matter. Do what God called you to do. He may not have called you to be famous. He doesn’t call most people to that, and often it’s his mercy, because fame would be a temptation to sin.

What is the decision that makes all the difference?

Brian: We call it the decision and the day. “I didn’t write today, but I’ve got tomorrow.” Then tomorrow becomes the next day and the next.

We’ve all heard “an apple a day keeps the doctor away.” It’s a great marketing line, but much to my chagrin, it doesn’t say “a Butterfinger a day.” I eat Butterfingers like Bart Simpson. But if an apple and a Butterfinger were on my kitchen counter, I’d love to tell you I’d pick the apple. It’s red, delicious, and healthier.

But I’m picking the Butterfinger.

I eat the Butterfinger. What happens? Nothing. So I think, “This apple thing is a scam. A conspiracy from the apple lobby.” Next day, same counter, same choice. It didn’t hurt yesterday, so I choose another Butterfinger.

But what’s the cumulative effect of a Butterfinger a day versus an apple a day over one year, five years, 20 years?

What’s the cumulative effect of writing every day versus not writing for a year?

If you write 250 words a day, at the end of a year with some days off, you’ll have 90,000 words. That’s a novel. If you call yourself a writer, 250 words a day should be easy. Once you start with 250, you may end up with 400, 500, or 1,000.

A speaker once said, “You can get excited about lifting 300 pounds until you get to the gym. Then you need a new excitement.”

Thomas: Be faithful in the little things. Don’t go straight to 300.

Brian: Are you faithful in the little things day in and day out? Set an attainable goal of 250 words, and you’ll probably write more.

Then condition your family to ask, “Was it a good day?” Not “Did you hit a thousand words?” Just, “Did you take one step toward the good works God called you to do?” If you can say “yes,” it was a good day. If not, the good news is you’ll wake up tomorrow, and there’ll be an apple and a candy bar, and you get to choose again. Be faithful in that, and the results are on the way.

God’s mercies are new every morning. Seeing each morning as a fresh start is one of the most encouraging things about this faith.

Thomas: We follow a king who calls us to a narrow road. It’s a high calling of rejecting evil and embracing good. But he’s also merciful. Eventually, the mercies won’t be new every morning because there won’t be a new morning, but until he calls us home, there are new morning mercies.

Our house is situated by a busy road, and I have small children. I tell them moralistic tales about fictional children who die on the road because people don’t respect the speed limits. One story is about a little boy who chases a ball across the street and makes it back home just fine. He does it again and again, until one time he gets hit by a car and dies on the road.

I want this fictional boy to suffer so my children don’t. The truth is that just because you ran across the road safely once doesn’t mean it’s safe. You never know when your last time is your last time.

God is offering you a new opportunity to be obedient. There are generic things we’re all called to do, like honor your father and mother, which may mean repenting from following the therapist’s advice of blaming your parents. But there are also multiple, specific good works God has prepared for you. Start with little things and work up.

If you’re discouraged and feel hopeless, you don’t have to be. Many authors start very late in life. You’ll make mistakes. But don’t jump straight into the big thing. Be faithful in the little things. You build confidence, and from little things you grow to slightly larger things.

In Jesus’s parable of the talents, the guy who was faithful with 10 talents was put in charge of 10 cities. It was a big jump, but he first had to be faithful with the 10 talents. Whatever God’s given you, be faithful with it. Don’t bury it in the ground. Good things do not happen to the servant who buries their talent.

Connect with Brian Hicks

• The Motivated Author
• Brian Hicks on X.com
• Book: The Way: Book 1 of The John 14 Chronicles
• Brian’s First Novel: The Tinderbox Tapes

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