To Blog or Not to Blog?



Celebrating! Removing the Stumbling Block
In celebration of this blog's three-year anniversary I went back to the beginning. I am marveling at how much I have grown as a blogger and how much I have learned. It's been an amazing journey that I am so glad I have taken. Thanks so much for coming along for the ride.

So I have a good friend who has been encouraging me to start a blog.  I’ve been pretty sure that blogging is not for me, but she loves it and has experienced much personal satisfaction and professional success from hers.

Why do I think I’m not meant for blogging? Quite honestly, I think it is self-indulgent.  Why should anyone want to read my options over anyone else's?  I mean really, I know I have ideas, and I know some of them are good.  A few of them are probably really good.  But none of that makes me any different from anyone else, right?

Don’t get me wrong.  I am a fan of the internet (and social media and technology in general).  I respect its value and I am in awe of its power.  And I am well aware that I probably only scratch the surface of what it can really do on a daily basis.  And like everyone else, I can’t actually remember how I survived before its existence.

To blog or not to blog; Removing the Stumbling Block
And as for blogs in particular, I’ve read a lot of them.  There are good blogs.  There are some REALLY good blogs.  But I keep coming back to this idea of self-indulgence.  Why should anyone read MY blog?  Why are MY ideas any better than yours?  And so that’s what stops me.  Because I find that I can’t get past this idea that a blog is just simply a way to promote me.  And really, that’s just not who I am.

So who am I? I am all the things so many other bloggers are; I am a wife and mother, I am a teacher, I am a friend and an amateur chef and an avid reader. But I am also a Jewish Educator.  And a Jewish Special Educator.  And that’s where all of my pondering about blogging comes in. 

I have, for 12 years, been directing a successful special education program within a supplemental Religious School in a Reform congregation in Central New Jersey.  I have, for many years, been the only one in my area running such a program, and I am still the only one in my area running one that is so expansive.  I have been asked to speak about my experiences, share my expertise and both help and encourage others to start programs.  I have served on committees, chaired task forces within the Reform Movement and have written many articles.  I have been recognized for my work, which is an honor and a privilege.

And so over the years I have thought seriously about putting myself “out there” as a Jewish Special Education Consultant to offer the workshops that I have developed, to speak about my experiences and to help empower others to create programs of their own.  But this brings me back to where I started…how do you “put yourself out there” without being self-indulgent?  How do you say, “I have a lot to offer” without sounding arrogant?  Where is the balance between necessary promotion and self-indulgence, and how do you find it?

Rabbi Hillel teaches in Pirkei Avot 1:13, “He who advances his name, destroys his name” and in the Babylonian Talmud we learn from Rabbi Joshua ben Levi that, “Humility is greater than all other virtues”.

And so I decide...to blog.


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1 comment:

  1. Blogging that is self-indulgent doesn't really go anywhere. Unless you have something to say that other people find inspiring, useful, entertaining, etc., they will just not read it. Many blogs are basically diaries read by the author and close family and friends. I have kept a couple of semi-private blogs like that.

    Nobody is forced to visit your blog. If they stay to read, it is because you have touched, moved and inspired them.

    And often, it can be a way for people to connect and share ideas, creating an on-line community that sustains all its members.

    Thank you for blogging!

    ReplyDelete

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