Crazy Writing Makes for Interesting Blog

Restored from the Empower Network archive (2011–2017), lightly edited to meet our current advertising standards. Views are the original author’s.

What do you do when you’ve made a commitment to blog but find yourself really, really not wanting to do it? (Added Note: This blog is unedited, so read through some of the crazy writing. You’ll see the process I go through to produce some of my blogs.)

Me? I sit down at my computer and just start writing whatever comes into my head. It may not make any sense at all. And that’s okay. If it does make sense, it may not flow well together. That’s okay too. The whole idea of doing this type of writing is to just get started. It’s called free writing for a reason. You are free to write whatever comes to your head. Eventually it begins to make sense.

I have the TV on in the background watching a movie. I have a bit of a headache. I don’t want to do this. So why am I? Why? Because I am part of a 21 Day Blogging Challenge. Because I have committed to do this for 21 days straight. Because this is the path I have chosen to create a new future for me. Now there’s nothing wrong with the life I’ve created. I am just in a space of needing to figure out where I’m going from here.

This type of writing can end up being stop and go, change direction, lose your train of thought, write about things you would never actually share with the world via the internet. Still it is a good mechanism to get your thoughts flowing. When you find something that seems to have some oomph to it, that’s the one to follow. Let your mind go till you reach the end of that line of thinking. You may have found your blog by writing it in one fell swoop. I know. I’ve done it.

Right now this doesn’t seem to actually be going anywhere, so now what? Hmmmm….. I’m now watching my daughter’s dog sit there on the living room floor and scratch at her collar. Now she’s gotten up on the couch and laid down. Yep this seems kinda like that joke going around. You know the one…. squirrel!

Okay, what value can I offer right now. I guess the main thing is to follow through on your commitments. That’s part of the integrity thing I’ve written about before. It’s sort of like making a promise. When my kids were young, they would ask to go do something. I would answer with something like, “Maybe.” They would say, “Promise?” and I would say, “No.” You see what I believe and what I taught them was that you never make a promise unless you know that you can and will follow through. Both conditions must be there. You need to be able to follow through AND you need to follow through.

Ever heard of pie in the sky promises? Well, I have. I’ve seen it too often. I was a foster parent to 30 children all from different families over a period of 14 years. I watched the faces of those little ones after visits with their parents. They were so happy. They were going home, or their parents were going to see them next week and take them someplace special, or their parents were going to buy them some fancy gift. When the parents didn’t call or show up for the next visit or the gifts didn’t materialize, they were crushed.

Have you ever watched a child lose faith? I vowed that I would never be the cause of that kind of pain if I could help it. So I never promised anything unless I knew that I could both have the ability to follow through and would actually follow through.

I stopped doing foster care because of personal reasons. My first marriage had fallen apart. I became a single foster parent for a couple of years. I’ll tell you though that providing the kind of care and support that these kids need as a single parent is extremely difficult. Who’s there to provide support and relief for you? I reached the point of burn out, the state of mental and emotional and perhaps physical breakdown.

To this day I can’t even think about realistically having my own dog. Why? Because I’m not sure I am ready for the responsibility. Until I reach the point where I know I can follow through on the needs of the dog, I will only avail myself of the joys vicariously, e.g. caring for my daughter’s dog while they are out of town.

I seem to have run out of things to say along this line of thought. Now what? I could pull in some research on foster children and their resilience, or the fact that most foster parents and social workers have an abusive or dysfunctional upbringing themselves. But quite frankly, I don’t want to do the research. I know these things are true. I have researched them in the past. You see, I have a Masters degree in Social Work.

Interestingly enough, all that schooling has not provided me with a satisfactory job. I don’t like working for bureaucracy and social worker jobs are generally for the government. Foresight didn’t land me in a job which provided a healthy working environment for me. I love making a difference for other people, but it needs to be in a loving environment. So… what’s next for me?

What’s next is providing a loving environment where people can bloom. This feels so right. It is the sole reason that I became involved with Empower Network. Just the name felt right. I loved it. What I found was a group of people who feel similarly. We work together to help each other learn and grow and eventually make money. Some will do that quicker than others. More importantly, it really doesn’t matter what pace you go at, you are welcome here. And that feels right.

Will you join me?