justing.net

Revising the Plan

By Justin G. on 22JUN30THU

OK, so what have I learned from the longer and the shorter recent blogging chain? And what am I planning to do next in this space?

Quick recap of what has happened: I signed up for micro.blog for reasons, there was the 30 day challenge pin which was enough motivation for me to post everyday for a month, I got that, and it’s been a struggle to post since then. I also read Bullet Journal Method 📚 which has been very helpful for thinking about focus, and about doing less.

1. Why do I want to do this, what was my initial motivation? I think I’ve got some things to say that might be helpful to others. I want to get better at writing effectively to say those things. I also have an idea for a novel that is not finished, so I need more practice at writing. Several novels actually. 📝
2. I am not sure how much time I really have for daily writing on the blog. I’ve gotten a lot of value out of improving and targeting my journal practice. Maybe I should just focus on that for now, for some limited time, and revisit later. 🤔 But I also think I got a lot of value from writing the blog posts too. 🧐
3. Churning out posts for 30 days on whatever was in front of me was fine, but kind of untargeted. I think an iterative improvement would be to align the blog writing with a longer term goal. Make the action of doing the blogging something that supports progress toward that. There are two goals (as already mentioned): my own observations, and progress toward my novel.
   • Advancing the novel could be research reports, exercises for writing, etc.
   • I hesitate to share my own observations because they feel unoriginal or derivative, or repetititve of something that I just read. Even though I know my own observations are unique to me.

   Oh, and reading reports. Everyone loves a good book report, right?

4. I still think writing is important for knowing what you know, and understanding what you think. I don’t want to stop doing it.
5. It is very easy to substitute “working on the blog” i.e. futzing with the css or whatever, for writing. Writing was and is the goal. I have mostly successfully avoided doing much futzing. Staying focused on the writing is explicitly the goal here. No futzing around.

What's next is that I sort out my goals and try to align my blog writing practice with those. I also continue getting real with what is practicable given limited time. I will also be experiment with being more intentional about post constraints, not just the alignment with the goals.

I'm not going to be hyperbolic and say that writing well is a super power, but it is a skill that makes you more effective at living.

To Reply: Email me about your writing.