Inspired By Moriah Jane

19 Jan

This month I am doing something a little different, sharing a story about someone I haven’t actually met in person, but who wants to share their story in the hopes of inspiring other people towards their dreams.

Moriah Jane’s battles have revolved around her physical health, battling short-term memory loss, borderline dyslexia, and chronic nausea which left her bedridden.

She told me that it took twice as long for her to learn as her peers, as getting information from the short term to long term memory has always been a struggle for her. And like many of us (me included) Moriah had to learn how her brain functions to develop tricks for memorising new information. She admits that her slow pace made her feel inferior to her peers, something else that many of us can identify with.

The way that they seemed to be able to pick up new information and memorise new words much faster than her was discouraging. She said “sometimes felt like I would never catch up”.

Although with her memory issues is Dyslexia, although it is more slight than full blown Dyslexia (hence Borderline Dyslexia) it certainly affects Moriah’s writing. Letters tend to scramble across the page when she tries to read them, resulting in words being spelled wrong, or sentences sounding confusing.

Despite these challenges Moriah (like me, and many others) had dreamt of being an author ever since elementary school. Her issues meant finding work arounds like needing to store notes for almost every small detail of her stories, where other authors have details on a mental file. She shared that “currently, I live in piles of sticky notes and journals to keep track of it all. But finding a way to keep track of information in a non-overwhelming way took a lot of time”.

And the services that are supposed to support writers didn’t always do the best job, her Dyslexia meant there were added areas in her manuscripts where an editor needed to give her advice on how to fix them. But the ones who had looked over her work insisted that the manuscript be perfect, before they started. That it was her job and hers alone to polish her manuscript into a flawless beauty. This created a lot of stress for her, and as she now knows no fledging author could work to that standard (and if we could no-one would need editors!).

Partway through college, she transferred to a different university to study Creative Writing as a major. Before she could transfer, she needed to complete some core classes at a different university, unfortunately the literature professor there hated Moriah. They thought the disability program was a sham designed to give certain individuals a free pass for their classes and so bullied any disability students who attended her classes.

It was only Moriah’s closest friends who knew she was transferring, to a college that was very hard to get into and coveted by many students in the area. Being modest Moriah didn’t want anyone to think she was bragging to kept the information to herself.

The professor curated class schedules for each student for the next semester, recommending the hardest classes for the students she deemed smartest, and those she disliked were recommended remedial style classes. Moriah ignored the professors antics, as she knew that she wouldn’t be deciding any classes for her, regardless of whether she stayed or transferred. And just nodded and pretended like she was considering the professors choices.

Maybe because she didn’t get a reaction the professor kept up circling back to her “lesser” students with her recommendations, and asked Moriah if she wanted to take Children’s Lit (she claimed it would be easier than studying Jane Austen or C.S. Lewis).

After some back and forth Moriah said “I haven’t decided what courses I’m taking next semester, I haven’t looked at classes because I’m transferring.” The professor thought that Moriah was going to say she was moving to an “easier” college, even suggesting the name of one. When she said, “Nope. I’m going to The Master’s University” the entire class broke out into a mixture of laughter and exclamations everyone (other than the professor’s favourites) congratulated her, asking about what classes she was thinking about at the new college.

I love this story so much, because someone with a modicum of power attempted to use that to belittle and block the opportunities and creativity of a disabled person, but not with grace and perseverance that person rises to the top leaving their bully behind him.

It was around this time that she became aware that she could use her talents to support her faith. Having convictions about not reading some materials she developed the desire to write stories free of the content she felt convicted not to read. This was not only helped shape the type of stories Moriah wrote, it gave her and all important goal to pursue.

About a year after college Moriah’s writing had to go on hold for about a year. She was bed-ridden most of the time, too tired and sick to sit at her laptop. Eventually she was diagnosed with chronic nausea.

The following year she was able to reset her projects but told me that it was slow progress with her poor health persisted for four more years. How incredibly frustrating it was, how she had to pace herself, writing just a very few words every other day to help her make progress on her drafts.

What she said next really resonated with me and maybe will with you too “it felt like a time where difficulties only stacked up and never lessened”. Her experience of trying to move forward with her diagnoses can, she said be “summed up in two words: stressful and discouraging”.

Through this time Moriah’s passion for story crafting kept her going, even on the hardest days. They were an escape from her reality on her worst days and an exciting adventure on her best days, she found solace in characters who struggled like she did, and watching these same characters overcome their difficulties was an inspiration and encouragement. Moriah knew she wanted to write stories and characters that had this effect on other people.

As we have already seen her writing journey was not an easy one, she describes it as “turbulent”, and like us all went through many learning curves and still does.

She describes feeling “passed off” with many writing mentors, often getting told that they couldn’t help her.

She feels that some of these mentors simply didn’t want to put the effort into a new writer, while others just couldn’t, giving reasons like ‘your writing is too advanced for me’, this news was shocking but she found it incredibly encouraging.

However, it meant that she was thrown into the industry all on her own, suddenly everything was up to her, which felt exciting and scary.

She says that she has gained fantastic friendships on long the way, although some days, she feels like she has to do everything myself. On other days, she receives the help she needs through irreplaceable author friends and supportive writing groups (which is where we met). It’s a crazy rollercoaster ride of emotions some days and a complete joy on others, regardless it’s a journey that has been worth it despite the circumstances and obstacles.

Moriah’s journey has led to her becoming an independent author and publisher of three published books (so far). Originally, her plan was to start out as an indie author then go traditional. But the process for traditional publishing felt too crazy, needing an agent, querying, and needing stories to meet specific criteria for publishing houses. She says “I am one of those authors who develops a vision for my story in my mind and simply cannot deviate, all the way down to the fonts used and cover design! So, I have stayed indie, and I am pursuing an independent career”.

Describes the experience as amazing but also not what she expected. That she thought that everything would change once I became published, that she would feel she had “made it” in the world, in reality, not too much changed.

Writing continues to be challenging some days and a breeze on others, while some aspects of writing and publishing get easier some never change. Even when she faces new obstacles, she can now remind myself of past ones she has overcome.

“I think reaching these achievements is extra rewarding in the face of disabilities, life circumstances, or even health issues. It feels like having a super power almost! Just think of all the healthy, non-disabled individuals who still haven’t written even a paragraph. But here we are, disabled, ill, suffering from the throws of life, yet we’ve popped out a book, written a draft, put pen to page. How many can say they have done that?”

Her hopes for the future include continuing to publish new and exciting stories, and to build a community of readers. She loves chatting about books, whether they’re her own or someone else’s.

And hopes to work on ways to manage her health so that she can start attending in person book events and selling her work at fairs, she describes this as an exciting but daunting task.

Beyond that Moriah hopes to find ways to encourage new and current authors to pursue/continue to pursue their dreams. She says “publishing isn’t easy, but if I can do it so can you, everyone’s writing style looks different. Embrace that, uniqueness helps your work stand out and gives it a special flavour. Don’t be afraid to experiment and pursue styles that work best for you”. Which is all fabulous advice, and I think that when people read Moriah’s story they will be inspired to start or continue with their own creative dreams.

Books

https://www.amazon.com/stores/Moriah-Jane/author/B07VGNMHMS?ref=ap_rdr&shoppingPortalEnabled=true

Darshan the God Slayer

Rogue

Souji

The Outside World

Edge of The Earth

Elias Edward’s: Vampire Slayer

Finding God in Anime: Volume One

Finding God in Anime: Volume Two

Vampiric Red: The Rogue of Vampires

The S.A Chronicles: The Exile and The Captive