To blog or not to blog (or rather when)

baconwaffles said:

In my opinion it's good to have a community, no matter how small, of those that share their Tarot adventures.

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I totally agree.

Herodotus said:

Sometimes I go for weeks without writing. Sometimes I post a couple times a day. It all depends on how I feel, but I understand feeling overwhelmed with real life sometimes.

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I'd love to be like that. I was thinking about this thread this afternoon - and how nice it would be (and this is one of the reasons why AJ's blog works so well I think) to have brief, concise posts. Once I start, I end up writing loads - but that's just different personalities and approaches at work. And then the photos and the cropping and the inserting and checking for typos and before you know where you are, it's a whole afternoon.

And I could have been out lying under a tree or throwing pebbles in a stream or something. But you have to love it. That's why you do it.

One other thing I should add is that as tarot has become an increasingly private, more introspective thing over the last couple of years I have felt less of a need to shout something - anything - from the rooftops. That has also affected things for me. It's all to do with phases...

Le Fanu said:

I'd love to be like that. I was thinking about this thread this afternoon - and how nice it would be (and this is one of the reasons why AJ's blog works so well I think) to have brief, concise posts. Once I start, I end up writing loads - but that's just different personalities and approaches at work. And then the photos and the cropping and the inserting and checking for typos and before you know where you are, it's a whole afternoon.

And I could have been out lying under a tree or throwing pebbles in a stream or something. But you have to love it. That's why you do it.

One other thing I should add is that as tarot has become an increasingly private, more introspective thing over the last couple of years I have felt less of a need to shout something - anything - from the rooftops. That has also affected things for me. It's all to do with phases...

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Ahaha. No offense - I don't think you've ever seen my blog. I don't know what your definition of "concise" is, but I very rarely write less than 500 words, and more often than not, I find myself well over 1,000 (once I hit 2,000, I cut it off, because it is just a blog, after all). But don't think I do it all in one sitting; my secret is that I have several WIPs in my draft folder at any given time. I work on what I feel like as I feel like working on it, and every so often, I find myself finishing multiple posts in a single day (that's a good feeling). That's not to say I don't find myself getting carried away every now and then - there have been many hours wasted away with needless editing, but hey, you gotta take the sh*t with the gravy, as my old man always said.

And personally, I certainly do not feel like I'm shouting my thoughts off the rooftops. You've got the wordpress site; you know that I can see how many people read my blog in a given day. For me, it's usually not very many at all. Like, six or eight on a good day, 20 on a VERY good day. Judging by the comments of others on here, you had a bit more than that, but that's beside the point.

I am relatively new to the Tarot. And so far, I use it more for private concerns than anything else. It's more of a tool for spiritual development than a tool for divination to me. It is a solitary activity, and I share it anonymously and with minimal revelation of personal details. I don't feel comfortable sharing my thoughts, but doing it anyway is therapeutic for me. It's got its benefits, as has been discussed already throughout this thread. But of course, that's not to say you should share what you feel is private. We've all got our reasons, and there's no reason you have to justify not keeping a blog.

You said it yourself: you gotta love it, and if you don't, then don't.

Herodotus said:

Ahaha. No offense - I don't think you've ever seen my blog. I don't know what your definition of "concise" is, but I very rarely write less than 500 words, and more often than not, I find myself well over 1,000 (once I hit 2,000, I cut it off, because it is just a blog, after all).

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I don't mean to sound presumptuous here.

I have a blog. It's somewhat occasional. It's not entirely dedicated to "tarot", per se, but I've talked about my deck project and some related things. I think most of my readers are not from Aeclectic. I've gotten some interesting feedback on there, so I suppose I'll continue. I expect as time goes on, other projects will take me off onto more varied and indirectly-related-to-tarot topics.

I've had a Tarot blog for about 8-9 years now. It's gone through different incarnations and through different servers, but it's still around. It goes out once a month.very much like a little Tarot magazine.

Takes quite a while to write each month, but it's a work of love, so always enjoyable.

I think each reader can't help having their own bias in the sense of how to read.

I mean if you were to write a Tarot book...How can you explain something where there ARE not set rules on the best way to learn or read. Where we are free to each add our own nuances to card meanings and invent our own methods. NO reader has a firm grasp on every single way or method the cards could be read. There much be thousands and thousands of them! No book could cover them all.

I think the best each writer of info on Tarot can do it to show what they believe has worked best for them, and maybe mention it as just THAT....what has worked best for them, but the person reading the book or blog has to experiment and find their own best path.

Then the person learning Tarot can read many books, get lots of different viewpoints on different ways things can be done and find in time which resonate and work best for them.

There IS no universal, one size fits all, way to do ANYTHING in Tarot. So the best readers can do is just show their point of views and beliefs and state them as just such, only their beliefs but the beliefs of others may differ and we each need to find our own best ways.

Babs

I've had a blog for seven years now. Last year I lost interest in writing reviews because of how time consuming it is. A lot of effort goes into my entries, and then I find people take my photos without my permission to promote their own readings, and that's not fun. I've had to file so many take down notices in the past year alone, even from reputable shops.

My blog is slowly turning into less tarot and more personal lifestyle, just because you can review so many decks until the reviews don't seem all that useful anymore. Or fun.

I like the idea of community, but my blog never really motivated people to get involved and add to it. And that discouraged me from posting more reviews.

I am also a huge fan of Le Fanu's blog, and go back to it every couple of months to see if anything has come up. : ) The passion in his blog entries is contagious!

Hullo! I've just been browsing your blog and thought I'd better pop back and say I really enjoyed it. I love how everyone brings a different approach to blogging, and their relationship with the cards.

Mine's a sporadic blog, though I do really love it. Same with my use of the cards (and my presence here on AT) I pop in and out, and the cards don't seem to mind