Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art

Ninja Blogging versus Stream of Spirit Blogging

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Painting by Fitzy

Rachel Held Evans and John Piper are Ninja bloggers. Pretty much every post is well and carefully written, and appears to have gone through multiple drafts.

I sometimes wonder if I should blog that way–producing the best writing I am capable of in every post, even if I have far fewer of them.
                                   * * * 
I produced carefully written, much revised and rewritten work for years. And also developed writers’ block–was so self-critical that writing became anxiety, self-doubt and work rather than play for me. It lost its joy.
For me to try to blog that way would be the sure way to stress and writer’s block. 
For me blogging is a way to psychological, spiritual and emotional health, as I keep current with what I am working out intellectually or spiritually or emotionally. It is deep play.
So, I have made peace with being good-enough rather than consistently excellent in my writing on this blog (as in all other areas of my life).
                                  * * * 
One of the most empowering writing teachers I had, Charlie Sugnet at the University of Minnesota, would give us really low-bar, low risk of failure assignments. I did the best writing of my life that term. (See this  or this published in my first book, Wandering Between Two Worlds).
 
Setting a low bar—being willing to open myself to the possibility of small failures on a daily basis–that is the only way I can see myself maintaining this enterprise of sharing my innermost thoughts with the world on an almost-daily basis without burning out.
* * *
What I am far more interested in could be called, I suppose, stream-of-Spirit blogging.
To hear what the Spirit is saying to me. To record it.
When I don’t know what to write about, which is often, I either look at my drafts folder for the overflow of those creative days when I have ideas for five posts, or I ask, “What is the spirit saying to me? What worry, joy, emotion, idea, insight or epiphany is uppermost in my thoughts?” And then I play with it. And as I do, the germ of the idea frequently develops into a fully-fledged 800 word blog post.
My blog will consist of other posts, of course, but this will be one way for me to maintain my own interest in it. To try to hear what the Spirit is saying to me, and to record it. (God’s ideas are limitless, and by tapping into them, we too find limitless ideas for blog posts.)
“A man’s reach must exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?” Robert Browning wrote.

So I guess my perhaps far-fetched ultimate ideal for the blog is that I may overhear what the Spirit is saying to me, and saying to the Church, and record it. Can a blogger or a blog have a sort of prophetic ministry? Who knows? Perhaps!
                                          
(edited archive post)

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  1. Thanks Tanya. Oh blogging is prodigally wasteful of time, and there are times I feel I hate it. I am feeling a tad burnt out at the moment.
    Today, I just rewrote a post on something important to me, “soaking prayer” which I feel I have never explained properly, and it was getting annoying to like back to a mediocre post. So I just wrote it out again!
    Blessings for health, Tanya, and on stewarding your energy with wisdom! Posts like your forget-me-not post can be used every year, you know. Your audience will keep growing, so it will be new to most of them:-)

  2. Great tips – thank you!
    (and so thankful that your biopsy results were benign…)
    T xx

  3. Hi Tanya, After a year of blogging, you will have a wonderful resource–your archive. Nobody remembers posts after a year, so I often refresh, sharpen and repost archive posts after a year. The Ninja blogging, for instance, was an archive post, as was yesterday's on bringing up recalcitrant church-goers. I write fresh stuff most days, but use archive posts when I am tired or busy.
    Otherwise, I look at my drafts folder and see what is alive for me.
    The key to easy blogging for me is to keep my spiritual life alive. Then ideas flow. When it's sluggish, blogging is an effort.
    Blessings,
    Anita

  4. Hi there – am just catching up with your blog – loving it! I love this post. Speaking as a 'ninja blogger', I often feel intimidated in the other direction – how do you consistently keep writing and finding things to write about so effortlessly??

    The pressures on the ninja blogger are 'what if people don't like it this week and that's the only thing I've done?' there's more pressure on the one post.

    I write down lots of ideas as I get them, and then when I come to write, I ask myself 'what is most 'present' for me at the moment?' most immediate, most pressing? I write that. Not sure if that is spirit-led or not…!

    Loving your ebb and flow – keep doing it!

  5. Sherrey, what is your blog? When I click on your name, I don't get to it?

    Ian, you write well. Don't worry about spelling and grammar. Grammar falls into place for a native speaker with practice in writing.

    I find reading things aloud is helpful in checking if you've clearly said exactly what you meant to say. Once we are doing that, we are on our way to writing well. Even after all these years, I sometimes find that my sentences are not clearly expressing what I want to say. Ouch!

  6. Oh, how I found myself in your words! I too wrangle with making sure everything is perfect in my writing to the point of walking away some days. Most teachers of writing say we should free write a lot in order to give ourselves the ability and yes, freedom to write comfortably this way. I fear being too far from the perfect grammarian and editor. 🙂

    Thank you for sharing your concept of Spirit Streaming. As I reach deeply into God's Word and his communication with me, I hope to find the best of my blog posts, whether pure grammar and perfect language or not. I want to serve him by dispersing the gems he shares with me. I believe this is exactly what you are saying here. And if we accomplish that, all's well and good, don't you think? I think I'll save my “worry writing” for my book!

  7. Hi Anita

    I really enjoyed reading this post this afternoon.

    Obviously as you are an excellent writer, and published authoress you probablly notice more irregularities in grammar and spelling than I ever possibly could.

    Where as with myself I have just one thought, to write it and hope I don't get caught up in the avalanche of my own writting errors.

    With the tiny hope some sense can be made of it by others after the avalanche of punctuation, grammar and spelling hits the bottom of the valley.

    And then I'm usaully totally mystified because someone has said, that they felt God or inspired or blessed by what I wrote.

    Though I am pretty sure if I tried to perfect my obvious lack of skill my writing would be even worse as I would worry about, if it sounded correct. And most likely cease to enjoy writing in my carefree way.

    I suppose it could be said, that I'm an irresponsible and prehaps lazy a writer, though I think I'm a happy one.

    I really like the thought Streams of the Spirit Writing or Blogging.

    I'm adopting that thought.

    Thank you for letting me read and comment on your blog post's it's such a lovely pleasure to do both.

    Warmest Regards
    Ian

  8. Thanks Aly and Mollie. I was spending too long blogging for the first year or two, so needed to seek God about how long I should spend on it. I have settled on 90 minutes, in which I try to write a 500-800 word blog, post it, and if time remains, draft the next day's.
    Which means I am sacrificing perfection of writing, but hopefully, it will still be good enough to speak to people's hearts. It would take much longer to get it unassailably perfect–and that might not be the best use of time.

  9. We were just talking about this as my daughter and I discussed whether bluebell was one word or two. My husband thought, what difference does it make to my readers? I try to write my best, but realize with time restraints some times that doesn't happen. If my daughter hadn't been reading over my shoulder, bluebell would have been two words. Smile.
    Writing should be a joy. I couldn't agree more.

  10. Oh my goodness, I relate to this post so well. Lately, I've been beating myself up for not spending more time finessing and editing and polishing my blogs, for not being a blog ninja. But at the same time, I feel like God has called me to write and share what He is currently teaching me, not what I can make sound the most polished.

    I love the idea of Stream of Spirit blogging. I think it is a wonderful guiding vision for blogging, and I think you do it quite well. You are blessing people with your words, thoughts, and vulnerability. Thanks for writing from your heart and not just what the blogosphere wants to hear. Keep it up!!