Celebrating 100 Posts!

So I just realized today that I have written 100 posts on this blog! This is my 101st post! I think that is worth celebrating!

So on this momentous occasion, I would like to share with you a quote from great literature.

"I know I chatter on far too much, but if you only knew all the things I wanted to say and don't! " Anne of Green Gables,  reproved for saying too much.

Now try this one on.
"If you only knew all the things I wanted to write and don't! " Kari Keener,  reproving herself for not saying enough.

100 posts deserves celebration.  It also feels like the perfect opportunity for a fresh beginning….new resolve to start digging out more from the deep well of thoughts in my soul that are begging to be written!

So many seeds of inspiration are left to shrivel away, whether out of forgetfulness, perceived lack of time, loss of motivation, or simply a mix of weariness and laziness at the end of the day that says, “Writing is the last thing I feel like doing right now!”  It can become depressing if I think about it too much.  I guess if you’ve never felt the stirring within you, it would be hard to understand why it’s such a big deal.  It’s like there is a dam of deep thoughts and words pent up inside me, and they want to come spilling out, but it’s not as easy as breaking the dam.

So many words…..

Sometimes a barrage of words can say precious little.   And sometimes a few well-chosen words can speak volumes.  What are words if you don’t mean them when you say them?  What are words if you don’t live what you speak?  Or write? 

I believe God has given me a gift and a desire to write.  Sometimes it burns within me, and most of those days I am left feeling frustrated because I haven’t done anything with the stirring.  I wonder what God meant me to do with this gift and if I am simply burying it in the ground because I don’t have the time or resolve to learn how to use it.

We have all been given gifts.  If God gives you something, then surely He also gives you what you need to use it.  But the gift is not like a magical super power.  That gift needs discipline.  It needs time and practice.  It needs to be developed and honed. 

I don’t want to just write.  To simply spill out a barrage of thoughts and words with little care of their meaning.  I want to write well.  I have many things to say, but I want to choose carefully the words that I use and craft them for impact, rather than volume.  I want my words to exude quality, and that does not necessarily mean quantity.  I long to write truth in a way that draws people in to a different way of thinking, a renewing of their minds, which in its course will work to change their lives. 

I know I have promised more frequent posts several times.  I always have that intention, but it keeps getting lost somewhere!  I’m expecting to have more time to write in the next few months as my life/work situation has changed for awhile and gives me greater flexibility.  But I should know better than anyone that envisioning all the free time I might have and what productive use I can put it to is only a pipe dream unless I put the rubber to the road.  I have to be willing to sit down, whether I feel like it or not, to exert the mental energy and sweat to pull out thoughts and form them into meaningful words and sentences that make sense, and to make myself write, even if it’s just a little bit every day! 

So if you’ll stick with me, I will keep at it.  I want to begin making a new habit of writing just a little bit every day, to try to keep those creative juices flowing.  The goal I’m working toward is one post a week.  That looks pretty lofty to me right now, simply because I know myself.  I know how easily I push writing aside for everything else.  I know my discouraged perfectionist tendencies….how I subconsciously tell myself that if I can’t do it well, (which often means I can’t do it to some abstract level of my own expectations), then it’s not worth doing at all!  

But maybe the things that take the hardest work, the things we have to push ourselves to do more than anything else in life….maybe those are the things that are worth the most.  Maybe our enemy knows this?  Especially when it pertains to gifts that God has put within us for the purpose of delighting Him, bringing glory to His name, and drawing people into His kingdom?  And maybe the enemy would like nothing better than to keep these gifts dormant and watch them never get off the ground because we fell for his carrots on a stick….all the little glittery things that seemed more worth our attention, and all the little “urgent” things that crowded in to monopolize our lives.  Yeah, I think I might be onto him. 

So reader?  If you’re out there?  And you’re on track with what I’m saying?  I just might need you to give me a push now and then.  Tell me to quit making excuses and keep the words coming!  Because maybe someday God will give me something to say that could change a life.  And I don’t want to miss that.