by Bethany Jett, @BetJett

Ladies and Gentlemen, we’re entering the last few days before the conference and excitement is mounting and the final preparations countdown has begun: one more trip to Walmart, gotta get the oil changed in the car…new suitcases airing out in the dining room. Has anyone else overtaken their home with paperwork, printouts, and 500 to-do lists? God bless you, Justin Jett, and all the spouses, family members, and friends who support us in our last minute craziness.

As we’re getting ready to travel this weekend, I would like every one to stop a moment, wherever you are, and take a deep breath.

And another.

Because no matter what happens, God is in full control of your conference experience and He has His hand on us as we get everything ready. There is a calming peace when we stop and remember that God has our backs.

There was an interesting shift in the Blue Ridge Conference Facebook Group this last week. Join us if you haven’t yet. We’ve been laughing, sharing, connecting, and asking and answering questions, but recently there have been more posts about prayer.

It’s incredible and uplifting. What an amazing group of people.

Different Goals, Different Plans

We are all coming to the conference with big dreams. Some of us will leave with agents and editors email addresses, some of us will leave with the numbers of new friends. There’s nervous excitement and an eagerness to be validated as a good writer.

We wonder if it was going to be worth the money we spent to attend and we each have a different idea of what success will look like for this conference.

I almost didn’t attend my first writers conference. There were a ton of doubts crawling through my mind. Who was I to think I’d ever get published? Why would anyone want to read my book? What if they laughed or thought I was being conceited? What if the market in my genre was flooded?

What if I wasn’t good enough?

God has an incredible plan for us. Each conference I’ve been to has brought forth different “wins” – each amazing and incredible, and often priceless.

The People, Ya’ll

Friendships weren’t on my list of goals, but the relationships I’ve made from each conference have become more precious than I ever imagined. Sometimes we get so caught up in the classes we are gonna take and the faculty we’ll meet that we overlook something super important. Sometimes the most important person for you to meet at the conference is the attendee sitting by herself in the cafeteria, or the gentleman who attends the same workshop.

It’s the people, ya’ll.

I used to dream of being on faculty at a conference. I loved when the conference directors or the faculty would talk about the other awesome faculty members and share stories about how they used to room together at conferences or how they got started at the same time.

That “same time” is now. That’s for us! You’re sitting next to the people who could one day be on stage with you after you’ve sold several books and are now teaching at the same conferences you attended when you were getting started.

You’re making those memories now, grabbing hands and walking this road together. The relationships you’ll make is truly the most amazing part of the conference. You can learn from anyone about anything at anytime. Thanks YouTube. You only get this one week at this conference at this time to meet these people and create those memories.

I met my “big sister” (in every sense of the word except biological) at a writers conference. It’s a precious relationship and almost unexplainable. Shameless plug, take our Pitch with Pep class, you’ll love it!

My two “Kindred Spirits” sat with me at a meal at a different conference. I wouldn’t trade our late night FaceTime “dates” for anything. They’re now my critique partners and closest confidants.

My agent became my agent after we spent an hour or two hanging out in the lobby after the last night’s Keynote presentation. We chatted about movies and our lives and started the seed of friendship. I fully believe it was that extra personal connection that sealed the deal, and let us have a pretty cool relationship that I treasure and respect.

Several business connections were born from conferences, and because we have the privilege of meeting other believers at these events, those business relationships have almost always turned into friendships, complete with random texts, Words with Friends privileges, and opportunities to host each other at our homes when someone is in town traveling.

Be Prepared to Come Back Next Year

Those are the reasons that a writers conference is worth much more than the dollar amount that is placed to cover meals, lodging, speakers, and all the awesome things that go into making a conference great. It’s why when you come back next year, you’ll solidify the relationships you start this time, like a big family reunion.

It’s why conference dates go on the calendar as non-negotiables. Lay the groundwork this year. Start the foundation of awesome connections.

It’s why we work hard during the year so we can celebrate, cry, rejoice, and connect as we continue this sometimes lonely career behind our computer monitors. Thank heavens for social media. 🙂

As a final word of encouragement, please rest the next couple of days. Enjoy your family. Take some time to breathe. Be mentally prepared that something might go wrong so you’re not devastated if it happens. Every faculty member and veteran attendee has stories about something that happened at a conference that was embarrassing at the time, but is now something they can laugh at because they learned from it.

We’re gonna have a lot of learning experiences this week. It’s part of the fun of making memories together.

Your Blue Ridge Conference Leadership Team and the amazing people at Ridgecrest are praying for you—for safe travels, for the family that you leave behind, for your projects and proposals that you’ve worked so hard on—and we hope that you are strengthened and encouraged this next week.

To dreams coming true!

[reminder]Any final words of encouragement before the conference?[/reminder]

Bethany Jett is an award-winning author of The Cinderella Rule, speaker, ghostwriter, and founder of JETTsetter Ink, a consulting and editing company. She has written for numerous publications and is the Conference Assistant for the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference.