Not by Chance

"Not by Chance."

This would have been my choice for the title but my editors at PositivelyFilipino.com thought otherwise. Here is my piece on Natividad (Nati) Delson. We worked on this for eight months. Of all the writing I've done, the process of growing this particular story showed me another facet of my voice, my role, as a writer. It further defines the position in which I find myself, in my various roles in our human community, again and again: "a conduit between two planes" as I wrote in "Melting Boundaries" (#30 Collantes Street, Carayan Press, 2015). My intention was to convey Nati's deep spiritual journeys in words which ring true to these experiences, while making the realm accessible to the audience. Actually, my original version was returned by the editors with this feedback:

Hi Lisa,..."this piece is very comprehensive and well worked out. However, for PF readers, thousands of whom are not familiar with nor are really interested in the natural healing path, it's very dense and hardly comprehensible"....."too many buzz words."

I confess that I stomped around the entire next day sulking.

Those "buzz words" had come from Nati. Sharing her exact words would provide a primary glimpse into the very world which might prove very foreign to the general readership. Wasn't this our calling as writers? To educate? To provide new sources? When I could finally come to some clarity about the value of the editors' feedback, which was actually generous, I most appreciated what was an opportunity to do all of the above. Most significantly, the initial soft rejection was a gift of opportunity to strengthen my conduit core. Here is the resulting story:

<a href=http://www.positivelyfilipino.com/magazine/a-healers-path-comes-not-by-chance</a>