Sara Goff
My Story
“Hope is hearing the music of the future. Faith is to dance to it.”
~Rubem Alves, Brazilian philosopher and educator
We all need purpose in our lives. Our career paths are winding, our children grow up, we relocate, learn to let go of loved ones, and often times feel we’re starting over. Through every new phase, however, we seek purpose. It is intrinsic to happiness.
My life used to consist of working long hours in the fashion industry. I was committed to pleasing my boss and being promoted, but I wasn’t passionate about clothes and profit margins. After all, I was an English Literature major in college with a burning desire to write!
I stayed on this path for seven years. You might wonder why I would continue living an uninspired life, year after year, keeping my dream of writing imprisoned in my heart. There was another side to consider, as there usually is: I felt proud to be part of a glamorous industry. I had job security, and every promotion meant praise and a pay increase. But frustrations built up as I denied myself the purpose I craved.
Just before my thirtieth birthday, I looked back on a decade of regrets and realized something very important: I was afraid to write, and everything else I did was a way of protecting myself from trying. My life up to that point was built on fear, a cracked foundation. I couldn’t even find the right boyfriend, nor imagine raising children.
So, I changed course.
Was I scared? One morning after quitting my job, I had to envision turning down the volume on my negative thoughts, just to get out of bed. It took tears and courage, but also an inkling of a belief that I was capable of more. First came hope, followed by faith.
Like little miracles, opportunities manifest when you make changes from your heart and follow a path of love and truth. Doors open. People emerge to show you the way.
My first writing query, after finding work in a nightclub to pay my bills, was at a local magazine called the SoHo Journal. I submitted a piece on The National Arts Club, and as a result, was invited to join. This was a membership I had dreamt of since moving to the city. Then, through the club, I volunteered in inner-city high schools and gained the experience of leading writing workshops.
I also volunteered at a local soup kitchen – the place to go for an immediate sense of purpose! After a few weeks of serving mashed potatoes and handing out lemonade in Dixie cups, I told a patron that I was working on a book. He asked if I knew about the soup kitchen’s writing workshop. I didn’t. It wasn’t long before I was working as an instructor for Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen Writers Workshop, an outreach for the homeless founded by New Yorker writer and author Ian Frazier.
The years I worked with the homeless and heard their stories probably influenced my writing more than any class I’ve taken. Even though I was their ‘instructor,’ the participants showed me how to write from the heart, no constraints or inhibitions. A few years later, with the first draft of my novel completed, I applied to Summer Literary Seminars, looking for feedback from other writers. The month-long workshop was held in St. Petersburg, Russia, and prompted a rewrite that took my story to a new level. A few years after that, I applied again, this time traveling to Nairobi, Kenya. This trip changed my life, as well as my writing, and laid a path for future purpose.
In 2008, I had to reinvent myself, again. Married and expecting our first child, my husband’s work moved us to Stockholm. I was thrown into wintery darkness with a new purpose: motherhood. But I couldn’t ignore my longing to write and to share the writing process with others less fortunate. I created Lift the Lid, a nonprofit that raises money to improve underfunded schools while encouraging the students to express themselves through creative writing. (www.lift-the-lid.org.) Three of the schools I continue to work with today I had met while writing in Kenya!
We were living in London when I first heard the words, “We’d like to offer you a publishing contract.” I was spending the night with my husband and son at Legoland in Windsor. The feeling of achievement was so strong, I collapsed onto our Lego-themed bed and cried. Four months later, even before receiving first edits, that publishing house closed shop. It took everything in me to start searching for a new publisher. I really thought I was back at the starting line, but actually I was a few steps from the finish line, at last. WhiteFire Publishing responded to my query letter a few months later and a new chapter in my writing journey began.
In my novel I Always Cry at Weddings, Ava is determined to make it in Manhattan, but as it turns out, Manhattan makes Ava. It’s been the same for me, whether living in New York City, Stockholm, London, or now Connecticut. Every time I’ve left my comfort zone and experienced trial and error in search of purpose, I’ve grown, dancing to the music in my heart.
Sara’s Chosen Charity
Lift the Lid
What Sara has to say about this wonderful organization:
I’ve been giving the proceeds from I Always Cry at Weddings to the charity I started ten years ago, Lift the Lid. LTL encourages self-expression and confidence-building though creative writing, and raises money to improve underfunded schools in Kenya, Tanzania, and the Philippines. We also make visits to U.S. schools to talk about “taking control of your path in life” and to engage the students in writing workshops.
Lift the Lid sponsors three schools in rural Kenya, an orphanage in Nkoaranga, Tanzania, and a center for children living on the streets in metro Manila, the Philippines. Our involvement with the schools is long-term, so we see firsthand how the students are progressing with their writing, how they are defining and refining their unique voices, and how their confidence and self-awareness is evolving beyond the constraints of living in poverty.
Since we started, LTL has raised over $120,000, 100% of which funds scholarships and projects such as building classrooms, a library and a science lab, buying uniforms and shoes, implementing and sustaining a lunch program, providing learning tablets and menstrual cups, starting a band with free music lessons, and funding a summer school program. We are a Gold Participant on GuideStar Exchange.
Along with annual writing competitions, we make yearly book donations in an ongoing effort to build/expand the libraries of the schools we support. Finally, since we began, the students have written hundreds of essays and poems, and we’ve published 165 of them, which adds up to a lot of reflection, expression, and believing in oneself!
