Zeal

Zeal

dcvkl.com 17 January 2026

[This is a work in progress; last modified 1/17/26.
Read a two page summary here.

Email private comments to Valerie@breakthroughawaits.com
and/or comments to share publicly to blog@breakthroughawaits.com]

gives way to an honest, intimate, jarring, and kinda loco memoir in this notably one-of-an-order portrait of a (previously) quiet & reserved saint/sinner. Tautologizing to the uttermost, Valerie unwinds topics of all sorts and takes them to a Source she typically sees as superior but struggles to respect when the stuff she senses seems to be regurgitation of people's platitudes vs. originated from the Only Holy One. Phrased partly as a questioning but quixotically persistent prayer and partly as a panoptic perspective into reasons for the paradigms and opinions that are - purposefully or unpremeditatedly - revealed whenever prayer pushes past the point of polite platitudes - this piece pulls parts from read and recollected stories into a taller tale that she takes to be truth. Take turns skimming and studying this strange read that regularly resorts to sound because sometimes searching the thesaurus simply isn't sufficient to tell a story solo. Even so, a song may serve as a salve in some circumstances; but typically there is no trick, no song, no thought universal enough to very well exemplify yearning. Zeal accepts that as assumed and asks anyway that you ask for breakthrough from a creative Being named Abba, Burden-Carrier, Daddy, Ever-lasting Father God however intimidating that invitation is. I have a good feeling that God can handle your intimately justifiable incredulity of His goodness, hang-overed/ingrained horror at guesstimated heresy, and other hurdles to having an honest and gracious friendship with the extremely different Creator that captivated me. May this creation beckon you too to copycat the Designer you were created to be connected with. Sincerely, Valerie Lukens

A small white flower with a simple happy face in the middle of big green leaves

Acknowledgments & Author's Advice

Ask with Brave Curiosity
Why a Cellist Begins Again

ASK AN ACRID ACORN if it aches to be an alder buckthorn berry. Attempt to break into the brittle core to discover either an embryonic dreamer or a despondent depressive, deciduous of even essential diatonic desires.
Curled between the cotyledons, a sign that it is capable of being born into something bigger, what begs to be birthed into a sprout stretching towards the sky, comforted instead of discouraged by the expanse?
What doesn't, instead choosing to burrow into itself, carefully calculating its chances of disappointment, declaring them too extreme to declare that there’s a chance for a better - anything?
Ask an abandoned cello, carefully stowed, if it despises its corner; whether its case is a bed, a cocoon, or a coffin.
Bravely step inside before the someday of someone coming for it comes. Cradled closely, does it become despondent each time it expects that finally it will be given a hand up so that with its human it would hone a gift for whoever would hear, grateful or not?
Does it hold images of having a group to flee into when its human had not had the gumption to hear it out beforehand - when what it heard in its imagination wasn't happening for it even though it had as much heart as the held instruments around it that had no issues?

Have it group for you whether field trips are energizing or draining. Does it dread the spotlight, concerned that its strings would sound scratchy if called upon?
Does it sing in the darkness, searching for certainty that it can? Does it consider the covering over its strings a blanket, comforting in its closeness or can that sensation be characterized as a stifling bully that constantly brings up its aloneness?
Ask the beginning signs of a book if it suspects the distress of editing to be an example of folly or if it's fulfilling; whether it is grateful to be handed to an illusorily impartial judge. Inquire of the jilted cut jottings whether they should be kept; whether the critiques are justified, whether inclusion in anything else is inevitable eventually, even without any adjustments.
If not, ask if an idea´s identity is irreparably injured or interchanged for an irreconcilable one if editing is accepted as justifiable.

What kind of cuts can be
considered without compromising the core?

In progress