Blogging As A Practice

Late in the night of Winter Solstice I was at a party, and the host prompted all in attendance to announce their "resolutions" for the coming baktun. Without having thought about it, I made a decision to write more often. It was something I'd wanted for a few months, and I felt that the formality of public pronouncement might lend strength to the decision.

Specifically, I resolved to write at least 400 words each day. I have not been especially loyal to that minimum. One reason for this is that initially I was trying too hard to work on fiction stories, when right now my inspiration is to write about my own life and experiences. This kind of writing isn't as comfortable to me, so it's taking some practice to feel like writing about myself counts as productivity rather than narcissistic mirror-gazing.

I've also been suffering from the usual artist's insecurity about whether anyone is really interested in reading my work, and whether it's worth doing if nobody is going to read it. The answer to this anxiety, of course, is to realize that it's worth doing for its own sake, and that art made for its own sake will generally find an appreciative audience eventually. Such art is often more deeply appreciated and loved than art made with the intention of pleasing an existing audience. It's the difference between pop music produced by corporations based on focus-grouped market research, and songs written by an individual with a guitar and a heartfelt message. It's hard to create anything truly great while worrying about it being popular.

So, in an effort to get into the habit of creating things and allowing them to float out into the universe, I'm going to start blogging on a regular basis. My goal will be at least one entry per week, without a whole lot of rules about length, content, or genre. I do not know how long I will hold myself to this pattern. I have a decent record for sustaining such practices - for instance, in my late teens I wrote at least one poem each day for over a year before deciding enough was enough. I sometimes feel that my best work is produced when I don't wait for inspiration to strike, but rather coax inspiration out of reluctance, fatigue, and tedium by working within arbitrary restrictions.

Here's to the future.