I’ve Been Sorting It All Out

I’m still here, sorting it all out as part of my cozy life reset.

I’ve been trying to determine what it means to be faithful at this point in my life with the talents the Lord has given me. How does the Lord want to use me to bear fruit in His Kingdom right now?

And what does that mean for our family’s future now that “retirement age” is not some far-off distant thought? While it is still quite a few years ahead for me, it’s closer for David. What we do with our time and energy over the next five to seven years will greatly impact the rest of our life.

For those keeping track at home, I quit tyrannical Facebook last month and acknowledged my limits by resigning from my (for me) time-consuming and mental energy-consuming position at church. The relief of no longer being C.E. Board Chair is immense. I enjoyed doing it, but I could feel the mental freedom literally roll across my brain when I knew I was done.

I’ve been sorting out the best way to keep going with what I do here when homeschooling will consume a lot of my time and mental energy for the next two school years.

I’ve been thinking about what it means to be a gifted Christian woman who is wired differently than most other Christian women, clearly sees things others often don’t, and is frequently not understood by the people around her in real life or online. (Follow-up post: So I Finally Joined Mensa)

I’ve been thinking about how to honor the limits other people feel they need while at the same time not compromising my own gifts and calling which don’t require the same limits.

I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with my news website which I personally enjoy writing and meets a need in my own life even though others don’t want to think about such things. (I mothballed and redirected it again over the weekend while I tried to figure this out again.)

I’ve been trying to figure out what to do about the massive insider leak regarding how Google ranks websites in search results. I specifically separated my two websites this winter (yet again) because I was fairly certain the political posts on this website were probably hurting my overall ranking in search engines with penalties for wrong think. Would people more easily find my homeschooling, Christian, cozy life, etc. content if the political stuff was relocated? Or is my name and online presence on so many black lists now (like Facebook) that it really doesn’t matter what I do? My conclusion? Google lies to webmasters and content creators. Google hates pretty much everything I stand for and so it’s pointless right now to weigh the desires of search engines into the mix.

I try to think win-win when I make choices. But with so much in flux with the online world, people, and the period of history we are in, it makes it challenging at times to determine what a “win” even looks like.

In the end, this is my website with my name on it. It reflects my life, my thoughts, and my experiences. I can’t do anything about what other people think whether it is someone who lands here on a post, a totalitarian search engine monopoly, or a treasonous social media conglomerate. I don’t do focus groups to decide what I should write. I don’t try to figure out my perfect reader avatar so I only create content she would like. (I tried that for about five seconds a few times. It doesn’t work for me.) I’m not a mainstream woman. Never have been and never will be. I’m an outlier in so many ways. I have rarely easily fit in anywhere unless I was in a leadership role. Being in a leadership role helps me fit in even though it also does tend to make you not fit in in other ways. Otherwise I frequently don’t. My interests, thoughts, and ways don’t follow the patterns of most people today.

None of this is written with sadness. It’s just who I am. I don’t know life any other way. God made me this way for a reason.

I have tried to be sensitive to my core group of readers because I truly do appreciate and value each one. At the same time, every single time I change something in a substantial way to please myself (you know, the woman who spends her valuable life energy and time writing and pays to keep this thing running), I lose a decent chunk of readers. Start researching complementarian versus egalitarian in the Bible and write about what you are learning? Lose a ton of readers. Write about the problems with the MeToo movement and the Kavanaugh hearing? Lose a ton of readers. Talk about Jesus? Lose readers. Write about current events? Lose lots of readers. And on and on and on.

So, in the end, it boils down to whether or not God is using me, if I enjoy what I’m doing here, and if it is worthwhile for my family.

I do see signs that God is using what I do although it would be nice if it was a bit more clear on a more regular basis.

I enjoy it when I do it my way and try not to care what others think. I say “try not to care” because it’s not in my nature to not care. The INFJ in me struggles with being “selfish” and doing what is best for me in this area.

I sometimes struggle with whether or not it’s worthwhile for my family. That’s something I’ve been taking a harder look at this time around. I’ve invested (and what sometimes feels like wasted) a lot of time with my online endeavors over the past twenty years. Sometimes I’m not sure the trade-off has been worth it if I’m completely honest. So I’ve asked myself if it is worth it to keep going or am I taking valuable time and energy away from my family today? The year? The needs we have for the future?

So that’s what I’ve been thinking about over the past week. I need to know what I’m doing matters today, tomorrow, next year, and for eternity. I need to do things in a way that is enjoyable for me because if it’s not then it is just one more thing on my to do list. I need to streamline my online activities so that they are doable when there are many other things going on in our family’s life.

Starting this evening, I will begin to make the changes that align with these goals.

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