Several times a month, I consider quitting the whole blog writing thing.

There’s a lot I don’t like about it.  I mean, posting one’s thoughts for everyone to see just seems kind of a self-important thing to do.  Granted, it’s not like I’m making anyone read it, but just the act of putting it out there seems to assume I think I have something worthwhile to say that others want to read.

Oh, hey, look at what I have to say!  I’ve even taken the time to put it in black and white because I’ve made the presumptuous decision that it matters to you!  Yay, me!

That’s weird.

And then there’s the whole mess that comes along with making one’s thoughts public.  It’s inviting criticism.  If you hold something up for others to scrutinize, prepare to be hit with a few arrows.  It’s all part and parcel.  Very few people can disagree respectfully.  Heck, they usually can’t even logically participate in thoughtful discussion.  Thankfully, that hasn’t happened openly on the blog itself.  I’ve seen other blogs completely held hostage by a troll.  *shudder*

But the hardest part about blogging is how it personally affects me.  Oh, it’d be no big deal if I always kept my writing to easy things like decorating or a list of my day’s events, or even only about funny things my kids said.  If I were blogging for me, that would be the way I’d do it.  But, no.  I often write about relationships and tender mothering and passionate marriage.  I share my failures and what I’ve learned through them.  I encourage women in ideas and standards that are vastly different than what the culture says.

What I’ve found to be true is this.

Simply by aspiring to greater blessing as a woman in all that I am and do, and by inviting other women to do the same, I find that those areas in which I write about become my biggest struggles.

I’m not one of those people who see a devil around every corner.  At the same time, I cannot deny the fact that those who openly express a viewpoint are held to a higher standard than those who sit and say nothing.  And call it spiritual warfare, fate, Murphy’s Law, or just coincidence, but usually anytime one takes a stand on something, their foundation will be tried.  It’s like a whispered sneer in your ear, “Oh, you think you had this figured out, didja? We shall see!  Does it hurt here?  How about here?”

It’s like I shared yesterday; In case you haven’t noticed, I am passionate about honestly relating the way I believe love and marriage really works.  Not because I think I’m an expert, because I’m not.  Most days I feel like I am grasping and clawing just to remain someone who has any right at all to claim to be in a happy marriage.

And, call me paranoid, but I swear that there are those who are just looking for cracks in our marriage and even see it as their duty to test the strength of it by any means they deem necessary.

Yet, I cannot stop writing.  I have taken time off here and there, to no avail.  The words eventually push up through my chest and pour out of my fingers, refusing to be sentenced to a life of mulling around in my brain.  I used to be content with scrawling them out in paper notebooks, and I consider often the wisdom in returning to that practice.  After all, if I have to write, why not just have it be for me, and no one else?

And then, one of you tells me how much you appreciate the blog, or sends an encouraging note to me expressing your thankfulness of something I’ve written.  Even when I took that several month break a little while ago, so many of you conveyed your disappointment that I had stopped blogging.  I was blessed by those of you who communicated the dismay you’d experience if I chose to never continue.

But, as much as I love my readers, I don’t exactly blog for you, either.  Because then I’d have to stick to subjects you want to read about and what good would that be?  You can read garbage about how cool you are and how you can fly on the wings of eagles just about anywhere.  Not here.

The encouragement is important simply because it’s a tangible confirmation of what, deep down, I already know.

Compelled, called, intended… whatever.  I’m just supposed to be blogging.