How to blog series
140 Ch Can’t Say It All Intelligently from the Heart
Every day I greet the Internet with my coffee and a clear purpose and I find lots of opportunity — information, ideas, and input — offering itself. Never a question about finding that.
If I’m not focused my head is filled with thoughts and energy sparking and flaring in directions that look something like this …
Unfortunately without focus so much can stay dispersed in that beautiful, but disintegrating way. I can end up responding to and considering bits of data like swatting gnats. Not much progress is made in a world of randomness.
Twitter, in particular, offers ideas I can encounter and pass along, but if I do that, most of what I think vanishes into past thoughts considered and soon forgot as unconnected bits.
If we want folks to know us we also need longer conversations in stronger venues. Telephones help. Personal conversations at meetings are great. If only we could stretch and scale our resources to share that way. So we write.
It’s why I keep my blog. In fact, that fact makes me passionate about why I write every day. But it’s not just the connections that keep me writing.
7 Real Ways a Blog Raises Influence and Increases Expertise
Writing is one way to share our thoughts with more folks more efficiently. Publishing makes the connection more natural and accessible. The words stay present and available through time for anyone who wants to access them. We get visibility and benefit others when we write, but we benefit ourselves as well. By recording our thoughts we make them more in so many ways.
- Writing gets us to clarify our thoughts. We have to find words to communicate ideas. We think the ideas through for ourselves. In that process we make them more concrete.
- Writing teaches how to see what we think. We have to find words to articulate what’s on our mind. We think the ideas through for ourselves. In that process we make our ideas more concrete, more transportable, and more memorable.
- Writing teaches us how words communicate meaning. Every time we write we choose the words we need to express a thought or idea. The more we practice the more we learn how to make choices that help people connect to what we mean.
- Writing helps us develop a voice that is natural and consistent, strong and confident. Even when we write for ourselves, we go back to read, listening to what we wrote. We question. We consider. We critique our choices.
- Writing teaches to manage our internal editor — to value our own thoughts and to be quiet until feedback is useful. Too often when we just think ideas we can shut them down before we’ve fully considered their possibilities. Trying to put them into words keeps us going to a longer process.
- Writing is an opportunity to share our expertise. Everything we write has an audience. Every time someone shares something that we write they add value to our ideas â when they change them and when they donât.
- Writing makes us more thoughtful readers and responders. We bring the insights and appreciation of a writer to what we read. It gives us a venue to ask questions and solve problems with help from the world.
As efficient as Twitter is for conversation, it’s not enough for working out ideas. 140 characters can’t express a full-on deep thought. A soundbyte might get attention, but it doesn’t show depth of knowledge.
I heard that quote a long time ago and I hold it close every day on the Internet. It keep as a reminder that writing raises my game.
We meet more people in print than we can ever possibly meet face to face. Many people will know our written voice as well as they know our names. Writing is a huge opportunity in a noisy world to teach what we know and to learn from the best of the people we meet.
What sort of thinking have you shared today?
Be irresistible.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!
Isn’t it time you registered for
I never thought about blogging or even writing in such a manner. I liked that through writing we can develop a stronger internal voice, and use this to communicate more clearly to our audience.
Hi CopyKat,
Nothing is more powerful than being able to understand and rely on how someone thinks. Our blogs allows to demonstrate our thinking for the world. Blogs are a powerful tool. The discipline of writing one proves that we can stay with a project. The words that we share prove that we know the field that we’re working in. My blog is a 4000 page resume that people can read one blog post at a time. 🙂
Glad to hear you found this one useful!
I like #5 the best. Especially with the instantaneous nature of twitter, the temptation to share minutiae looms large.
With a blog, you are able to have an overarching goal and purpose for the entry. Tapping that inner editor helps to add clarity and utility to online communications.
In answer to your question about what type of thinking I’ve shared today? In keeping with twitter’s #ecomonday theme, most of my tweets today have had to do with sustainable businesses, practices, urban planning and other ecologically-driven links.
I did retweet something about the power of reciprocity on twitter, which I believe provides the underpinnings of growth and effectiveness via this (and other) media:
Me too! RT @Marilyn_Res: I like what @missrogue says abt the importance of generosity in social media http://bit.ly/b8IB5S #sm
Great information. Thanks for providing the forum.
Best, M.
Hi mckraig,
Welcome! I love the statement that Especially with the instantaneous nature of twitter, the temptation to share minutiae looms large. couldn’t agree more!
Whole conversation are important too. Imagine trying to get a process built or explained using only Twitter? Twitter keeps us riding on the surface, but at some point I have to reach for a telephone, email, or my blog to get a little more depth and clarity.
Thank you for sharing what you’re thinking. I’m still thinking about sharing our expertise efficiently. 🙂
My favorite point is No. 2. I love to muse over which words I want to use to make my thoughts come alive. Writing gives me the opportunity to paint a picture with words. My favorite bloggers seem to be story tellers. I like to take a jump in their world.
Hi Terez!
I love to choose my words carefully too. You do paint pictures with your words and write with a spirit that brings people into your stories. Just the way that stories attract you.
This is the one year anniversary of blogging for me. Nothing I have done in the last decade has been better for me personally and professionally. I am more clear than ever before how I can help others through what I do. Blogging has provided clarity, commitment, and community.
Congratulations, Bret!!
I so get what you’re saying!
Hi, Liz,
Thank you for putting these points down on “paper.” They really resonate with me, and I am sure most other people who attempt to write on a consistent basis. My partner in life is a writer by trade and she has often said she cannot think without a pen in hand. Thanks for this blog, and thanks for letting me drop by your saloon. I guess I am no longer a stranger. Nice to meet you, Liz.
Best,
Joaquin
Hi Joaquin!
I started my blog to keep to the discipline of writing every day. It’s been a great friend to me in that way. I’ve developed my voice and my ideas. It’s also let me figure out what it means to “own my dad’s saloon.” Thank you for coming by to visit here.
You’re not a stranger anymore. 🙂
I must have been in the writing cave when you wrote this one. I like. As much as I enjoy playing textual tetris on Twitter, all that concision makes my brain go haywire after a while. Kinda like that picture up there.
I bet the epic poet-writers didn’t spend all morning writing haiku’s first. ^_^
Hi John,
It takes a while to have a whole conversation. Holding onto a thought and carrying it until it makes some point is a work that takes more than 140 characters … and most folks write rotten haiku btw.
Now you’ve got me thinking … I like that about you.