Too often, the distance between where we are and where we want to be seems impossibly long. Trekking through the lonely terrain of lost opportunities, unmet expectations, and silenced dreams leaves us weary, at best, and sometimes, feeling unequivocally hopeless.
• The doctor said she had six months to live, but she didn’t get six weeks.
• You knew your marriage was struggling but didn’t expect him to leave.
• A sudden diagnosis forces you to make a hard-right career turn, and you’re wondering how to start over.
We trudge dutifully, even when forward motion is little more than survival. Fear whispers from behind its forked tongue, introducing doubt, slowing our step, and sending us off-course.
You and I meet in this place of unsure footing—a place I call The Middle. We’re not where we used to be, but we’re not where we planned to be.
I may be a few steps ahead of you or several behind.
Regardless, I hope you find new grace for the journey and a surer place to stand in the contemplations you find here.
Welcome to The Middle. Let’s travel through together.
The Middle isn’t a destination; rather, it’s a conduit – or a classroom – for helping you become who you were meant to be.
• Shannon W. Williams •
What To Expect
Perspective.
What you see is what you get.
We usually say this in the context of identifying authenticity. But it’s also about perspective.
Thomas Huxley famously said, “We are prone to see what lies behind our eyes rather than what appears before them.”
One of the crucial things you’ll find in this book is perspective – the ability to see where you’ve been, and where you are – from a higher vantage point. From there, you’ll get a clearer vision about where your next steps need to take you.
Inspiration.
Inspiration is more than a warm, feel-good moment. It has to be. We don’t remember names like Nelson Mandela or Mother Teresa because they make us feel good, but because their lives introduce clarity about who we can become. And their examples create new awareness about the good we can do in the world.
You’ll be inspired by the people you meet in Meditations for the Middle. None of them wear capes or have superhuman powers. They’re ordinary people who decided The Middle wasn’t a destination, but rather, a conduit for becoming who they were meant to be.
Hope.
True hope is never shackled by circumstance. Rather, it’s forged in the disorientation of heartbreak, in the numbness of grief, and in the anxiety of failure. If the opposite were true, hope wouldn’t be hope at all.
As you read the book and journal about what ushered you into The Middle, your changed perspective and new inspiration will birth hope. And hope will be your companion through where you are now, into what’s next.
Why this book? Why now?
You have bookshelves lined with dust-covered volumes full of good advice, inspiring stories, and well-intentioned counsel.
So, why should you read this book? Why now?
I can’t answer the question for you, definitively. But I can tell you something about pace, rhythm, and timing.
A good bit of what’s in Meditations for the Middle has been marinating in me since December 2003 – the month that marked the beginning of a decided push toward the end of my first marriage.
I’ve spent the last twenty years unpacking what brought me to that moment, and trying to heal from a place where family systems, unresolved trauma, personal ambition, and moral failings collided.
In a very real way, the season between December 2003 and 2023 has been The Middle for me.
I’ve learned a thing or two – about myself, about the process of healing, and about some of the mile markers you can look for while traveling through The Middle.
And I have a feeling that maybe your own pace, rhythm and timing brought you here somehow.
This isn’t a book about marriage. But it is a book about movement, about forward motion, and about the inner work it takes to move through the changes and challenges you’re facing.
JOIN THE LAUNCH COMMUNITY
Meditations for the Middle will be released in December 2024. Use the button below to pre-order your paperback or hardback copy.
If you plan to give the book as a gift, let us know when you complete the form, and we’ll include a bonus for your friend or family member receiving the book.
It will also be available as a journaling tool (pictured here), and a coffee table book (below) with original images captured by the author, just for this project.
If you’d like more information on the journaling tool or the coffee table book, subscribe below and we’ll send you updates as we finalize details.
Shannon W. Williams
Author, Speaker
Shannon is a husband and father, a writer and photographer, a designer and strategist, and a restless creative from Columbus, OH. You can read more about him here.
Meditations for the Middle is his debut book release.