Giving up blogging

Just to be straight up clear: the title is a verb phrase, not an intention.

It is however a verb phrase that I’m contemplating.

I found out my grades for fall term, and they were ok. I was kind of hoping for a little higher, but I guess I would always hope for a little higher unless they were all As. But it put me in a mind set of looking forward to being at BYU and taking classes again.

2007 will definitely be a difficult year. There will be lots of change in my life. For one, I’m fully planning on graduating this year. What happens after that point, I don’t know yet. But there will be a lot of things different about my life twelve months from now. That is going to create a lot of stress as I adapt to the changes which I will find along my way.

One thing for sure, is I need to make sure that I’m an incredible student this studentupcoming semester. I’ve been thinking about what things I might need to do to promote academic success, and one of the things which crossed my mind was to give up blogging. I’m not yet sold on the idea, but I’m not going to discount it yet either. I guess I’m thinking out loud (in writing) about it here.

On one hand, I get this great sense of accomplishment from the one or two thousand people who read from my blog every month. This is well over double what it was a year ago, and I’ve learned a lot about what it takes to write for an audience. I also think that writing has helped keep my mind keen and fresh.

One the other hand, blogging can be a big distraction, especially the constant urge to continually check to see if there is a new comment. It is a further distraction if you include “reading other’s blogs” with the whole blogging verb. It takes time too. I think I average about 20 posts a month. If each post takes half an hour to write, then I’m spending 10 hours a month writing. An extra 10 hours a month spent on some of my classes sure would have helped.

On the first hand again, blogging could be viewed as a constructive way to blow off stress. It is relaxing, reflexive, and fun. I’m sure someone could even come up with an argument saying that blogging is healthy, but I don’t know that I would go that far. Not only that, but it is possible that I help other people when they read some of the things I have to say.

On the other hand again, if I were to compare blogging to other activities such as hiking, talking with friends, or watching a basketball game, blogging would lose. It definitely does not seem like a priority.

So as I finish my exploration through the various advantages and disadvantages of blogging, I’m still not quite sure what I should do. Obviously if I could keep the advantages while discarding the disadvantages then I would surely be better off.

Do you suppose praying about blogging is even appropriate?