Notes from the Wayside: Introspection: We (Don't Really) Need to Talk About This Blog

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We (Don't Really) Need to Talk About This Blog

Speak to the Israelites and say to them: Once you enter the land that I am giving you, the land must celebrate a sabbath rest to the LORD. You will plant your fields for six years, and prune your vineyards and gather their crops for six years. But in the seventh year the land will have a special sabbath rest, a Sabbath to the LORD: You must not plant your fields or prune your vineyards. You must not harvest the secondary growth of your produce or gather the grapes of your freely growing vines. It will be a year of special rest for the land.

Leviticus 25:2-5 (CEB)

Gotta do what you can just to keep your love alive
Trying not to confuse it with what you do to survive
In '69, I was twenty-one, and I called the road my own
I don't know when that road turned onto the road I'm on

From "Running on Empty" by Jackson Browne

If you've been following this blog for a while, then you might have noticed that I've been posting more frequently this year than I did in the last couple of years. There's a reason for that. After some rough years marked by sadness and anxiety, I wanted to return to some semblance of normalcy, and for me this meant blogging more consistently. If you're especially observant, you might have also noticed that my posting has become a bit more inconsistent over the last few months. There's a reason for that as well. Lately, I've felt like I haven't really had many good ideas for blog posts. For lack of anything else to write at this moment, I thought I might address the state of this blog.

But first, I'm going to backtrack a bit.

In late 2008, I started preaching at my church on occasion. I started this blog early the following year, because I didn't want the sermons I wrote to sit around collecting proverbial dust after I delivered them. In the early years of this blog, I didn't have a regular posting schedule, but I did try to publish four of five posts every couple of months. In 2015, I started posting primarily on Sundays.

In 2016, I managed to post something every week, though there were couple of times when I posted a few days late. At that time, I was going through some transitions, and blogging regularly seemed to helped me to get through it. By the end of the year, I realized that I wasn't always posting my best work, so I decided that, going forward, I would give myself one week off per month. That new schedule worked well for a few years. In 2019, I started making it a point to post something introspective once per month, as I was trying to make some progress in my life.

In 2020, I started to struggle amid the pandemic. At that time, inspiration was in short supply, yet reasons to be depressed and anxious were abundant. I still managed to publish forty blog posts that year, thanks in part to the Lenten series I wrote that required a tighter schedule. In 2021, I continued to flounder. I posted less frequently, but at least I still managed to post something every month. Last year, I posted even less frequently, and there were a few months when I didn't post anything at all.

This year, I was determined to return to the blogging schedule I had followed until 2019. I managed to stay on schedule for a number of months, and I was rather proud of myself for doing so. Then, in late September, I seemingly hit a wall. I published my last post for the month nearly a whole week late, and, because I wasn't especially proud of it, I didn't share it on social media. In October, I managed to meet my goal of publishing four blog posts, though I posted three of them late and didn't bother sharing two of them. Truth be told, I was writing and posting for the sake of meeting my goal. When I set out to do something, I really don't like to give up.

And now, here I am on the last day of November, posting an introspection I've forced myself to write, having just published my previous post just a few days earlier. I'd be lying if I said I haven't find myself hating this blog at times over the last few months.

Starting a devotional journal in 2014 helped me to start writing and publishing blog posts more frequently, yet I think it has become part of my problem. My reading plan is based on the Daily Lectionary,¹ which is made up of a three-year cycle of readings, so it is naturally repetitive. Furthermore, prioritizing the Gospel readings as I do makes my reading plan even more repetitive, since there are multiple versions of many of the Gospel stories. Quite often, as I reflect on the day's passage, I find myself revisiting thoughts I've already shared, so I'm not having many new ideas for blog posts. Sometimes, when I look back on old blog posts, I feel like I've expended all my good ideas.

The blog posts I always manage to post on schedule are the sermons I preach. When I'm scheduled to preach, I have to pick out a Scripture passage and a sermon topic weeks in advance, and I don't exactly have the option to finish writing my sermon a few days late. It is probably worth noting that, of the five sermons I've preached this year, only one of them was actually new. One sermon was a revision of one I wrote back in 2017; another was a renamed and heavily updated version of a sermon I wrote back in 2014; and two others were based heavily on blog posts I wrote no later than 2017.

As I've already noted, I don't like to give up when I've set out to do something, so I still intend to meet my goal for the year. That said, I know I need to make some changes going forward, though I'm still considering what I'm going to do. On the one hand, I know that I need to be more intentional in my personal Bible studies and that I need to be more deliberate about learning new things and not just revisiting old thoughts. On the other hand, I realize that I might also need to adjust my blogging schedule. Maybe I should plan to write a little less frequently next year so that my better ideas can surface, or maybe I should begin next year with a short hiatus. Like farmland, we sometimes need to lie fallow so that we can remain productive.

I want to express my appreciation to you, dear reader, for taking the time to read what I write, even if this happens to be the first of my writings you've read. I hope it was worth your time. If you have any sincere suggestions regarding what I should do going forward, please feel free to share them with me. I don't want to quit sharing my thoughts on this blog, but, if I do continue blogging, I want to actually enjoy it.

Notes: