A few months ago, in October, I participated in something called “write31”, which is essentially a link-up for anyone who wanted to blog each day during the month of October. I blogged daily, writing a series on communication. I don’t think anyone else on that link-up list even noticed I joined the link-up, which is fine, as I was doing this more for myself than for anyone else.
I read back through some of those posts, and I readily admit and recognize how much I do not know about the subject. The field is vast, and I only shared a small tidbit, based on very limited knowledge and information, as I am not an expert by any means; I picked a subject matter I was interested in. If I were to do it again, I see some specific areas of improvement – which is a good thing, to keep improving.
I participated in this exercise twice in previous years; once I made it halfway through October, and the other time I made it about 2/3 of the way. This time, however, I did blog the entire month.
Not only did I learn some new things about communication, but I also gained something else. Writing every single day did the job it was supposed to do: motivate and inspire me to keep it up and do more. That month of daily writing kick-started my blogging in a new way.
Previously, my goal was to blog at least once a week. But now, after that month of daily posting, I am actually finding I can post 2-3 times a week. In fact, I have to limit my time. I used to feel as if I had nothing to write about, struggled to come up with ideas, and had nothing interesting to write about, as I’m not at an expert on anything, like a jill-of-all-trades and master of none. I’m still not an expert on anything, but I do have more ideas and motivation than before. All that to say, that is why I have been posting multiple times per week, and I hope I can maintain this level for a longer time.
In addition, since then I have been writing (or I should say typing) in my own personal journal almost daily, as opposed to a few times a week or weekly. Even though I may have wanted to write every day, I didn’t. It’s not difficult for me to churn out at least 5 typed pages minimum almost daily, and occasionally more. This is not material I would post for the most part (trust me, you’d thank me not to see the many pages of twaddle and blather), but it is meant for me, and may contain seeds here or there for future writing topics amidst the pages. Like so many others have said, I often do not know what I’m going to write about until I sit down and write, and I often discover things I never knew in the process. One of my main goals was to continue writing daily and practicing writing often, and that is exactly what that month of daily blogging inspired me to do.
Julia Cameron, in her book The Artist’s Way, calls this practice of daily writing “morning pages”. Many of us call it journal writing. The idea is to train oneself to write every day, practice every day, and from those pages come ideas. It works.
Another thing I want to mention is that while I may write of goals and doing this or that, I need you to know that I am an imperfect, broken person who does not have it all together. I may have lofty ideas and goals but I regularly fall flat on my face. So… I may speak or write of goals and blah, blah, blah (doesn’t that sound eloquent?), but truthfully, I can’t do anything except by the grace of God. Tomorrow, I could find myself completely incapacitated. I’m just stumbling through, fighting various battles, trying to figure things out, like most everyone else.
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