Join us as we welcome back our very first return guest, author Craig Cunningham, to talk about his new fable, The Cathedral.

Craig shares the origin of the story—a years-old vision of building an actual cathedral in the West Texas desert—and how that idea eventually merged with his own journey as a writer into the tale of Adeo, a boy called to build a cathedral of his own.

Craig walks us through writing the first draft in three uninterrupted days in Terlingua, Texas, how he finds the voice for every one of his stories, and the four mentors who guide Adeo across his life: the traveler, the architect, the magician, and the angel. The conversation lands on the book's central twist...the cathedral was never the building. It was always being built in him.

Listen to the full episode for:

Craig's story of finding his novel's voice through a single opening line, and why that line changes everything for him creatively.

A rich discussion on why self-promotion feels impossible for so many creatives, and why doing it anyway matters.

Lauren and Steven's own stories of building something (a coffee shop, a music career) that shaped them more than the outcome ever could.

Resources from the show:

The Cathedral

Three Days In Terlingua

Craig's Website

One Night In A Thousand Years Film Journal

The Cave, The Road, The Table, and The Fire

Kurt Vonnegut On Buying An Envelope:

(talking about when he tells his wife he’s going out to buy an envelope)

Oh, she says well, you’re not a poor man. You know, why don’t you go online and buy a hundred envelopes and put them in the closet? And so I pretend not to hear her. And go out to get an envelope because I’m going to have a hell of a good time in the process of buying one envelope. I meet a lot of people. And, see some great looking babes. And a fire engine goes by. And I give them the thumbs up. And, and ask a woman what kind of dog that is. And, and I don’t know. The moral of the story is, is we’re here on Earth to fart around. And, of course, the computers will do us out of that. And, what the computer people don’t realize, or they don’t care, is we’re dancing animals.”

Chapters

00:00 Welcome back from summer break
01:58 Craig Cunningham returns — first repeat guest
02:27 Reading the back cover of The Cathedral
04:31 The genesis: a cathedral in the West Texas desert
06:44 Writing in Terlingua — finding the voice
08:12 The opening line that unlocked the story
10:58 Reading the book's opening passage
17:38 The four mentors: traveler, architect, magician, angel
20:35 The ending — the cathedral burns, and the twist
22:39 "The project is never the project"
26:16 Lauren on Storied Provisions and process over outcome
27:20 You don't know the impact of what you build
28:57 Steven's winding path in music
32:04 "Obedience is the only strategy"
35:11 Why you have to actually tell people about your work
39:45 What's happened since The Cathedral released
42:28 Where to find Craig and the book
44:48 Buying local + the Vonnegut envelope story
47:58 One Night in a Thousand Years update
54:24 Closing thoughts