Meet Edward Wiggins

We recently connected with Edward Wiggins and have shared our conversation below.

Edward , thanks so much for taking the time to share your insights and lessons with us today. We’re particularly interested in hearing about how you became such a resilient person. Where do you get your resilience from?

Where do I get my resilience from? My faith in God. There have been so many situations that I’ve been placed in where there was simply no way I shouldn’t been able to come out on top, but when I stopped worrying about it the way forward would be revealed.

I remember asking my wife, who was girlfriend at the time, to help me plan a performance. We spent sometime looking for a venue and simply couldn’t find one within the price range I wanted. Then, my wife emails me a list of venues, one of which offered to lets us use the space for free as long a we donated our proceeds to charity. That was an open door that God swung open for me.

I remember another time when I was laid off from a job that I was hoping to advance in for a full time position. God told me to release an album, and when I release that Album, I prayed to see when and where I should apply. The very first job I applied for, I was hired on. I stayed at that job for 2 years and got 3 substantial raises.
God opened that door as well.

So resilience comes from the fact that God has big plan for me and He keep showing up in ways that are incredible and nigh unbelievable. If He’s going to keep coming through for me that way, then why would I make His efforts on my behalf fruitless by giving up?

I stay resilient in my art because He stays resilient in making a way for me. Because He won’t quit, I wont!

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

First and foremost, I am a worshipper. I devote my life to God in everything that I do so that people can see Him in my life and in my work. I want to set that up because everything I’m doing now stems from that aspect of who I am.

From that, I demonstrate my worship in the form of songwriting and poetry. I have been a Child of God all of my life and with that comes ingrained knowledge of Biblical principles that have taught and studied through my life. I use my songs to present Christ and His principles in a fantastical and creative light.

Let’s be real, the God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and the Bible are complicated topics for most people, because there is so much controversy surrounding them. What I hope to do is make music and poetry that introduces God to people in a palatable and fun way. Yes there are difficult topics in Christianity, and there are black and white aspects of it with no gray area. But if can presents the person of God to the people before they run into the opinions about God, then I have done my job.

The most of excited part about writing is performing. I love to watch people interact with my music. It’s one thing if you enjoy your music, or you understand the metaphors that you were using in the story that you were trying to tell, but it is a completely different things when people resonant with what you are saying and come out to listen your music and enjoy it with you. I love that people.

Write now, i finishing up a project to be release on the 19th of September entitle In Nature. It’s a four song EP that uses Naturesque metaphors to discuss some of the foundational aspects of Christ and Christianity. It’s personal in a way but I wanted to really tell the story of God and Christ using flowery imagery that captures the mind before the mind has a chance to catch up. I wanted people to see the painting before they began analyzing, and that what this project it.

I also had a little fun with by singing in Japanese for some of the lines. So I look forward to that release.

All in all, I do all of this so that God can be glorified and so that people can come to know Him through Christ by listening to my art.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

The three qualities that I would say are that were most impactful on my journey were faith, perseverance, and connection.

Faith for me is to trust God. This music journey is difficult on so many levels. You are tempted to forgo your voice to match the trends, you are tempted to compare yourself, and you are tempt to give up constantly. The only thing that keep me going is the fact that I trust God and He showed up when I did. Trusting God kept me from changing my self to fit a mold in a society that is trying to force your to look like everything and everyone else.

Along with faith is perseverance. Even though God came through I still have fight through difficult, doubt, and set backs as I waited for Him to through. I had to have patience in the seasons of preparation where it looked like nothing was working out while at the same time, still creating when it seemed it was in vain. So perseverance is extreme important.

Lastly, I said connection. God placed people in my life for long term relationships and short term relationships. There would be times where those people either encouraged me or contributed to my music and vision in some way, and each time they did, it would always be what I needed; “in Due season” as they would say in church world lol. But none of that would have happened if I wasn’t connected to those people, I wouldn’t have gotten what I needed as a person and for me vision. So Connection to others is very important.

My advice for people who are getting started is this: Trust God, keep pressing on even when it looks like nothing is working out, and lean into the relationships that God placed in your life (don’t isolate yourself).

We forget the value of those abstract things because they don’t produce immediate results, but they do keep you in a mindful to press through discouragement, so keep them intact.

Any advice for folks feeling overwhelmed?

When I feel overwhelm I pray, talk to myself, and rest when needed.

I pray because it gives God space to talk to me so I can hear what I need to hear to be encouraged and to continue one. I also pray to refocus my mind on God and off of my situation.

I talk to myself to remind myself that the overwhelming moment is just that: a moment. It will not last forever so I can look past it rather than stress out about it. I also talk to myself to push myself past it because many times being overwhelmed is mental thing, not because the situation itself is overwhelming.

Lastly, I rest. If I feel overwhelmed, it’s probably because I’m exhausted in some way. So I take the time to calm my mind, step away for a moment, or go to bed if need be.

My advice to other is to know yourself, know your limits, and know when to either push passed you limits or recognized you are over-extending yourself and respond according.

Persevere by balance rest with challenging yourself.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edwardwigginsmusic/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/edwardwigginsmusic
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@EdwardWigginsMusic
• Other: Spotify:

  Fiver:
  https://www.fiverr.com/eddiewiggs03

Image Credits

Brianna Clarke of Divinely Photographed