Along with the need to stop following my friends, I decided I need to change the way I blog. Instead of an open-ended conversation all day long, I needed to shorten and sweeten the whole process. How?
BLOG, LOG and SHUT the front door.
You all know what that means. There is no need to keep speaking once all the words have been said.
Many of us blog because we have things to say. Words that claw around inside our souls until we write them down, let them out or scream them from the rooftops. Some of us are just too opinionated and a blog is a safe place to be so. Some of us have no one to listen to us, so we write here. Some of us simply need to write. We are writers and writing is what we do. So do it. Write. …and then SHUT the front door.
This is how it works for me:
BLOG – Get out the laptop and let it all out. Write, write, write until the words have found their end. Whether it is writing or reading or photography or digging ditches, there is a sense that the day’s work has been completed. You know the feeling. When you have worked hard and have exhausted your reserves, but you aren’t actually exhausted. When you have that feeling of achievement. When enough checks are on the list and something else calls your name (like your children). That is when blogging is done. Done-done. Not another 100 words. not another 20 photos. Not another check facebook, check twitter, check stats, check pinterest. DONE.
LOG – If I just quit working I feel unsettled. It is like going to bed without doing the dishes or leaving for a trip without doing a final walk through the house. It can certainly be done, but it leaves a few loose ends. When I am finished with my work for the day, I need to tie up those loose ends. That means checking the calendar, getting my blog posts lined up in order, rearranging my articles in Houzz to be worked on the next day and making sure all my ducks are in a row. It does NOT mean check facebook, check twitter, check stats, check pinterest. That is part of work and work is done. I’ve already checked them all twice, now is not the time. Now is the time to get my brain settled with what it has accomplished today and prepare it for what will be accomplished tomorrow. Start checking a million and one things and your brain will never settle. PLUS, you will see that amazing thing SHE made and that amazing magazine SHE got in and that amazing…blah blah blah JEALOUSY!
then…
SHUT it – shut the laptop. Walk away. Stop talking and start listening. The birds are talking, your kids are chattering, the dishwasher is making that lovely and satisfying clink-clink-clink. You can’t hear it when you are blogging. So shut up and listen. Your soul will thank you.
Of course, that is what I tell myself all day long. Do I always follow my own advice? No. Should you? Probably, but no, you won’t. We all screw up and we all run too hard and too fast, but never on the treadmill. Blogging is a marathon and can become a career, so don’t burn yourself out by forgetting how to work. work requires rest and if you don’t take it, you’ll just up and quit the game. Don’t do that, k? Just blog, log and shut up. Love ya.
Want to add your rants and raves about blogging? Link them up baby!
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