Three Years of Blogging

I began this blog on September 27, 2011, with a post called Twelve Good Things I Learned from Being in a Coercive Religious Group.  I have tried to post consistently at least once a week since then (except at Christmas time), and this is my 169th post!

Here are a few things I've learned from my experience of blogging so far:

1.  It's really gratifying to have so many people read something I've written, without having to try to get a publisher!

2.  It's even more gratifying when I can feel that what I've written has helped someone in some way. I started this blog with the purpose of spreading comfort and good news to people (especially my fellow Christians) who have felt constrained, shamed or coerced by religious teachings which don't seem to be the "truth that sets free" that Jesus and Paul both talked about.  (And, incidentally, to just flap my metaphorical gums about whatever interests me, which I love to do too!)

3.  Blogging is like what I've read about newspaper writing:  the blog becomes a beast that has to be fed regularly.  Therefore you constantly surf the blogosphere to see who's talking about something interesting, and you rack your brains for ideas whenever you don't have anything in mind that you particularly want to say that week.

4.  After three years-- well, this starts to get burdensome.  You start a blog to express yourself, and it's fun, but then when your 169th Friday rolls around and you realize that you don't even want to write that week, you start to think about this not actually being a job . . . .

5.  And when you work full time and have kids, there's only so much time you get to take for yourself.  I discovered that writing a blog means I don't have time or energy for other kinds of writing.  And about a year ago, I found a way out of the corner I'd written myself into in the young-adult fantasy novel I'd been working on for years-- but I haven't been able to pick the thing back up again and finish it.

So this blog today is an explanation of why I'm not going to feed the beast every week anymore.  I plan instead to just write whenever I have something I really want to talk about.  This will probably be at least once a month (not counting Christmas time), so if you're subscribing to me, please don't unsubscribe!   And sometimes I'll probably simply post links to other people who are saying things I think are well worth reading.

I've built up a good body of work (see my Topic Index) about walking free of coercive, authoritarian and/or legalistic religious teachings.  I hope people will continue to find those helpful.

To my readers: thanks so much for subscribing, for reading, and for commenting!  You have been more valuable and helpful to me than you know.  Please do stick around; you'll be hearing from me soon!