I’m Starting a Blog (For real this time…)
Here is why this time will be different
It’s Sunday afternoon. It’s hot out, I just ate a lot of tomato sauce in a bowl with cashews and green olives, I have groceries to unpack and dishes to wash. I don’t feel like writing this now.
But I made a commitment: to write for twenty five minutes and post it. It can be shit, it can be self-absorbed or cliched (and oh hey voice of judgment, I hear you).
The point is: I showed up. I’m following through.
That voice of judgment, the perfectionist and high achiever, she has helped me in many ways, and she has also kept me stuck. She is the one who says I’m not ready, who says I need to do xyz first and do it this way and I need to figure that out before I can begin.
I’ve started a blog before, more than once, though the one I maintained most was called brainfogdays. I originally created it through wix and then moved to wordpress, though I haven’t touched the content for years. Now on wix I created another site (yaelshira), still very much in its infancy.
It’s the new moon, and the Jewish month of Elul, which is the last month of the year. I saw a friend yesterday and we spoke about what goals — or experiments — we want to integrate this month. I said that I want to develop my blog.
- Framing it as an experiment instead of a task to achieve: For the next 30 days, I will experiment with posting daily on my blog.
- And treat it as practice. I’m doing this to learn, it’s a training.
- SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time-Bound. → I will spend 25 minutes a day creating content for the blog.
4. Have fun with it. Include things that make me laugh. Create something I will enjoy, and enjoy the process of creating it.
5. Let go of the “I need…” I don’t need to do xyz first. I don’t need to do it any certain way, and it doesn’t need to be any one thing. Release the expectations and allow it to evolve, knowing that it’s going to keep changing (life is change).
6. No comparisons. Not original? Don’t care. Not as polished-professional-witty-pretty as that one over there? Don’t care. It’s something else. It’s my something else.
7. Share it, or don’t. When and how I want to share it with people is my decision. There is no one waiting for this, no one standing over my shoulder critiquing its development.
I know I do want to share it, but the point is, first I need to have something to share. So before jumping ahead to when and how and where I’ll share etc, focus on making the something, and take it from there.
For now, it is my experiment, practice, SMART goal-setting challenge, fun-space, free-to-be, incomparably me. And I’m going to show up, follow through.
(and thats 25 minutes)
