A Time to Pivot

This is my 200th blog, posted on this website that I created using a WordPress Theme (there are thousands to choose from). I spent a lot of time last summer revising the appearance, choosing a new theme, and working to make your reading experience better.

Start Logic hosts my website for annual fees that include security so that I don’t get hacked and neither do you. My husband supports this endeavor, just as he has every venture I have attempted since we married. What a crazy resumé that would make.

Is writing my blog a hobby or more important than that?

I’ve been asking myself this question for the past few weeks, during which time I have not posted a new blog. I have numerous drafts, but I’ve lacked passion or clarity to create new content.

At the beginning of this year, I heard a podcast where the topic was a book called Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away. Wondering if I should quit blogging, what I remember from that conversation between host and guest was this statement.

“I had a website for books I hadn’t written.”

ZING!

I began this website in order to create a platform for books I haven’t written. Yet.

Oh, I have started writing more than one book. But finishing and publishing a book is not the same as thinking I have a great idea, or even knowing what to write about. Still, I’m working to complete a manuscript now.

I have lost count of the seminars I’ve attended (online and in person), books I have read about writing, and all this on top of four years spent in graduate school where more than anything else I may have learned about the Bible, or about people, or about myself, I learned to read carefully, to think for myself, and to write.

I have the luxury of writing what I want, what I care about. Blogs (web logs) are like my journal entries where much of what I write relates to what’s happening now. Playing WORDLE, I never use the same word to start because random word choices seem to work for me.

In March of 2020, I resumed writing a weekly blog and published consistently, thinking I could weigh in on what was happening during the pandemic. Quickly, it became clear I am not equipped for controversy.

I had hoped readers would respond to specific topics. Reading? Books? Movies? The Bible? Cultural Commentary?

And as much as I appreciate every single person who takes time to read and comment, no consensus surfaced. A comment is like catching a fish and then releasing it back to the vast ocean of information that engulfs us all.

With email boxes filled to overflowing, why should I add to people’s screen time unless I can write something worth reading?

Without exception, every single time I have run out of inspiration that fueled my writing, someone either in person or a written comment would say something that gave me just enough gas to keep going.

In a blog I follow, the writer explained her reason for moving to Substack to publish her blogs. She said, “What I write is free for readers. But it isn’t free for me.”

She’s right. More than the cost of doing business, the investment of time and thought and carefulness to edit my own work (which is HARD), it all adds up.

So is this a hobby or do I care enough to keep writing, sending messages into the void?

Is this how God wants me to spend the days numbered in this one precious life He has given me?

But like each of you, my life demands daily attention.

I have no shortage of ideas. Curiosity leads me to all sorts of interests and for all kinds of reasons.

I need to give myself schedules and deadlines, just like I had in school.

Writing demands TIME. Focused time. Careful attention to details. Writing is a solitary pursuit.

What do I know?

Between reading and thinking, writing sits in the corner, patiently waiting for me to venture into the arena.

In daily reading of the Psalms this week, this verse jumped out at me because of a blog I wrote in October 2021, titled “What Do You Know for Sure?”

“This I know, that God is for me.”

Psalm 56:9 ESV

I know for sure that God wants me in the arena. Not a spectator, but a participant in this glorious and wondrous life where people all over the world can connect, exchange ideas, and grow through reading and thinking about life, as we live it.

Editor: a person who corrects or changes pieces of text before they are printed.

My last three semesters at Dallas Theological Seminary, I served as editor of the student newspaper, Jot & Tittle. When I interviewed for the job, the faculty advisor looked skeptical, hesitating before giving me a chance. Haply, I won his admiration and an unexpected scholarship for the extra work involved.

I then discovered that I really enjoyed pulling together articles other people had written to both represent and enrich the readers of our newspaper.

When I noticed that fifty tabs were open in my Internet browser, I thought, why don’t I share some of what I’m reading and what interests me to inform, inspire, and educate my readers?

Stay with me as I pivot. The game’s not over yet.