Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion
Prayers for the Creative Christian and Entrepreneur
Wheatley Award Winner and entrepreneur, Nigeria Lockley explores how to use the power of prayer to strategically manage your business and keep the faith in the process. Learn how to make God the CEO of all your endeavors and connect with Him on a deeper level with, Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion.
Christians are often taught that God must be involved in all that they do. Yet there is little guidance on how to get God more involved in our business ventures in a meaningful way. In Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion, author Nigeria Lockley explores areas of struggle that creative Christians and entrepreneurs must overcome in order to excel.
Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion will address topics like:
• Alignment of Purpose—what you want must be His will.
• Finance—understand that you should not feel guilty about earning money using your gift, however money, money, money can’t be your mantra.
• Networking—who you know may be important, but God has already ordained divine connections for you.
• Discretion and Discernment—know the difference and use them both.
Through transparent testimony, biblical guidance, and a prayer strategy pulled from the book of Nehemiah, Lockley provides believers with prayers to take the pursuit of their passion out of this world. The paperback edition includes space for readers to develop their own prayers for each issue dealt with in the book.
Excerpt from the Chapter on Balance
There are some who say living a balanced life while chasing your dreams is a myth. You’ve got to relentlessly throw yourself into the work, striving day and night to get things done and make it happen. Then there are those who believe you need to be balanced instead of busy. I spent three years throwing myself relentlessly into the work. I was on for twenty-six hours a day (yes, I added extra hours to the day). Every day melded into one day until I found myself in the middle of my seventh period class clutching my chest. The next day, I was determined to prove God was able and I still made the trek from Manhattan to Brooklyn. However, before the bell for first period rang, I was out the door and on my way to the emergency room. After a battery of tests and several trips to every doctor under the sun to find out what was the catalyst of my chest pains, I discovered that my body was basically falling apart. I had low iron and a cyst.
It seemed like I needed to lock myself in a closet and say that strength prayer over and over again until I saw it fulfilled, but what I needed was balance. Every day I was trying to give one hundred percent of me to my writing, to my students, to my children, to my husband, and to God. I was trying to be everywhere at once, and that’s God job.
The order of the situation was all off. God has to be first every day and above all things. The same amount of time that we willingly devote to our passion must be allotted to God. He must be a part of all of our workings to maintain balance. Look at how He created the world—one day at a time and everything in order.
To pursue your passion in a Godly fashion means putting God first and everything else in its proper order. Does this life require long nights? Yes, especially when you’re just starting out; however, bouncing around like a balloon whose air has just been let out is not a requirement. Don’t live an unbalanced life that will have you everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Is this possible? Your gut is telling you it’s impossible to achieve balance and run a business. But it is possible. God was busy establishing the whole entire world as we know it, and He was never as frazzled as we are. We’re just trying to build brands, write books, and open new businesses. We just have to follow the blueprint He left us. The only true way to find balance is to seek God. God worked on a different aspect of creation each day. He built the whole world one day at a time.
( Continued... )
© 2016 All rights reserved. Book excerpt reprinted by permission of the author, Nigeria Lockley. Do not reproduce, copy or use without the author's written permission. This excerpt is used for promotional purposes only.
Order books from Amazon: amazon.com/author/nigerialockley
About the Author
Nigeria Lockley possesses two master's degrees, one in English secondary education, which she utilizes as an educator with the New York City Department of Education. Her second master's degree is in creative writing. Nigeria's debut novel, Born at Dawn received the 2015 Phillis Wheatley Award for First Fiction.
After the success of her novels and the launch of her own publishing company, Inheritance Books she is committed to pushing woman to pursue their passion, walk in their purpose, and live in prosperity. Nigeria serves as the deaconess and clerk for her spiritual home, King of Kings and Lord of Lords Church of God.
She is a New York native who resides in Harlem with her husband and two daughters.
Intimate Conversation with Nigeria Lockley
Nigeria Lockley possesses two master's degrees, one in English secondary education, which she utilizes as an educator with the New York City Department of Education. Nigeria's debut novel, Born at Dawn received the 2015 Phillis Wheatley Award for First Fiction. After the success of her novels Nigeria is committed to pushing women to pursue their passion, walk in their purpose, and live in prosperity. Nigeria serves as the deaconess and clerk for her spiritual home, King of Kings and Lord of Lords Church of God. She is a New York native who resides in Harlem with her husband and two daughters. Visit her website at: www.nigerialockley.com
BPM: Could you tell us something about your most recent work?
Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion is a mixture of commentary and prayers for creative Christians and Entrepreneurs to connect with God and deal with some of the issues they'll encounter as they on their journey to pursue their passion. Is this book available on Nook and Kindle? Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion is available on Gumroad a platform for independent artists, authors, and entrepreneurs to sell their products and Amazon. It will be available in Barnes and Noble and other retailers soon.
BPM: What inspired you to sit down and actually start writing this book? Why now?
When you begin to chase your dreams there are so many people who ask you questions about what you're doing and when I originally thought about writing this book the plan was to answer those questions in Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion, but then things became really challenging for me. I had to deal with business stuff, my husband didn't understand what I was doing, and I had to keep the faith at the same time. That was how Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion became this book of prayers.
BPM: How do you deal with balancing faith, family and business? Do you have any tips for us?
Journaling helped me pull it together and write Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion. Keep God at the helm, don't neglect yourself or your family. Learn to trust God that it will all come together. He built the whole world one day at a time and that's how we have to build our businesses.
BPM: This is your first non-fiction book. Was it difficult to write?
Yes!! I was so all over the place at first trying to figure out what I was doing. However, once I surrendered and said "I want to do this Lord, but I don't know what I am doing." He just opened it up to me. The most difficult thing to overcome was that feeling of not being qualified. But when once I realized that God is the qualifier...it was on and crackin'.
BPM: Is writing easy for you? Do you feel lonely being a writer?
Writing is easy. Editing is the hard part for me. I know plenty of authors who love the editing process, but it makes me want to pull my nails out. No, I don't feel lonely as a writer. The Lord has blessed me to connect with some of the best in the business and they take care of me.
BPM: What did you enjoy most about writing this book?
Writing the prayers was the most enjoyable part of writing Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion. I wanted to improve my prayer life and this book definitely pushed me closer to God and improved my prayer life.
BPM: How long did it take you to complete Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion?
It took me about five months to finish Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion.
BPM: Do you have any suggestions to help me become a better writer? If so, what are they?
Don't write the story or book that you believe is going to sell; write the story that you want to tell. Do not force yourself to fit into a box or follow prescribed formulas just to make it.
BPM: What period of your life do you find you write about most often?
I've written my whole entire life. The only period of my life where I wasn't writing was when I gave my life to Christ and I was trying to figure out what God wanted me to do.
BPM: How does your book relate to your present situation, spiritual practice or journey?
Throughout Pursuing My Passion in a Godly Fashion, I discuss learning how to do business God's way and not prescribe to the worldly ideas about different issues like purpose, competition, and finance. I went through something in every chapter in order to write those chapters, right down to having no money in the bank and having to believe that God could resuscitate my business.
BPM: Did you learn anything personal from writing your book?
I learned that I'm more resilient than I thought. Between dealing with marital issues while getting this book done and holding onto my faith I made it on to the other side of this project.
BPM: What were your goals and intentions in writing this book? Do you feel you achieved them?
My intention and my goal for Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion is to help support creative Christians and entrepreneurs get into position to prosper by using prayer and biblical principles as their guide.
BPM: What does literary success look like to you?
Literary success for me looks like a catalog of books that create and effect change in people's lives, encourage growth, edify readers, and are a chain or link in the spreading of the gospel of reconciliation of men back to Christ.
BPM: What projects are you working on at the present?
In terms of business I'm working on content for my writing and marketing coaching program the Publishing Pow-Wow which is becoming a digital course in 2017 as well as content for the Position Yourself to Prosper Program--a holistic approach to Pursuing Your Passion in a Godly Fashion. In the literary sector I'm working on pumping out my next release Children of God, a stand alone novel.
BPM: How can readers discover more about you and your work?
Readers can discover more about me by visiting my website, www.nigerialockley.com and they can connect with me on social media at some of my favorite hangout spots: Instagram @NewNigeria, Facebook: www.facebook.com/authorNigeriaLockley, and Twitter: @NewNigeria. My book is listed on Amazon: http://bit.ly/PursuingYPGF
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