Reflections on (Almost) 100 Days of Writing Every Day

“There’s no such thing as talker’s block…”

And with those simple words, Seth Godin blew my mind. God used his book, The Icarus Deception, to provoke me on the journey of writing publicly daily. Tuesday will be the 100th day since starting and I thought it would be a good time to look back at what I’ve learned.

First a confession: I haven’t written every day. Looking back since November, I’ve missed about 15 days total. Most of those days were misses because life or the churches were consuming all the time I had.  Second confession: Some of my posts were better than others. In fact, on a few rare occasions I wrote simply because I said I would, not because I felt like I had a lot to say.  But for the most part, it has been a lot easier to write from my heart than I thought.

Now, some things I’ve learned from writing daily:

• Less but better is important. This was something I’d been musing over for a bit, but it really became true the more I wrote. There certainly isn’t the time for lengthy, detailed articles, but the short bursts I’m able to get out when inspiration hits have connected with my audience.
• Fear is over-rated. I’ve shared this with a few friends, but prior to writing every day my posts were primarily shared on Twitter. But once I started writing every day, I decided that fear shouldn’t have a place in my writing. So I started posting these blogs on Facebook where friends and family who haven’t read my blog got a chance to read. Embracing writing and not being bound by fear of what others think has been helpful. It turns out, my fear was what was holding me back. And guess what? Facebook has become the place the vast majority of my readers have come from and I’ve had lots of great conversations with people about different thoughts I’ve gotten to share there.
• Unexpected posts travel farther than expected. Sometimes I’ll write a post thinking I’m going to be the only one interested in a topic. Men and Becoming Missional by the Power of the Holy Spirit were like that. Each of these were just posts near and dear to my heart but I wasn’t expecting them to touch people. But I’ve had several people reach out to me sharing how they were inspired by them. I wrote I Want You…to Plant a House Church as a simple post making readers aware of my intent. But it got shared all over the place and has become the fourth highest read post this year.
• This has been about us, not about me. Along the way it’s become clear that me being able to write has been about a community. Writing every day has helped me figure out exactly who is in that community. Felicity, Gunnar, Aroea, John, Dan, David, and countless others have been cheering me on along the way. Without you and your experiences, comments, and sharing, I could never have kept writing. If anything, I’m able to write daily because I know there is an audience waiting for the content.

In a way, this post is both a  “lessons” learned post and a giant thank you. The fact that you’ve all allowed me to have some of your day the last 100 days means the world. I hope that these posts continue to encourage you and that by the time we hit 365 daily posts, we’re all better for it.