Re-Inventing Myself Again. Except, Not.

I started my first blog years ago.

I had dreams of becoming a famous blogger. Really, I just tried to use it as a means of earning income so that I didn't have to get a job.

I have reinvented myself as a blogger many times, thinking that "if I could just find the right niche", "if my blog was pretty enough" or my writing good enough or my topics interesting enough...people would want to read my stuff.

My first blog was on Xanga, and I didn't even know what a blog was. I shared my raw thoughts there. It was mostly unhealthy and drenched in sin.

And then I moved to blogger. I started out as Wisdom's Pupil where I shared about motherhood and wifehood. And then The Happy Homemaker where I shared much of the same but also homemaking stuff. Then I was Stepping Out of My Boat, which was about where God was taking me. And then I became Hannah in Grace Land, which is a lot of just what God gives me to share.

But here I am, 11 years after I started my first blog and my audience hasn't really even grown. It's changed. The people who love me enough to read my writing has changed drastically. And as much as I have tried, I have never made a penny from my writing.

I have asked myself a million times...why aren't I good enough? Why can't I make this work?

At this point in my life, I believe it's simply because that's not what God has for me. At least it hasn't been yet, maybe it never will be.

One of the things I've done to improve is buy a subscription to Lysa Terkheursts Compel and The Nester/Emily P. Freeman's site that I can't even remember the name of.

It's all great information. But I unsubscribed from both for the same basic reasons...it's good information, I just don't think there's a formula.

I don't think it's something that can be taught to everyone. Sure, good things come from it and I don't think I'm worse off than when I joined those sites...but I just don't think it's that simple.

Writing is what I keep coming back to, but is it what God has for me, or is it just what was/is accessible? My portal to the outside world, with very little risk involved?

I don't know the answer to that.

I don't think I am ever going to be a successful writer. To be honest, I am not sad about that. I am frustrated and curious and . . . tired.

The thing is, I just want to be in God's will for me. Whatever that is. I want to be using the gifts He's given me...regardless of where that ends up being.

One good thing is that I can look back at the things I've written over the last 11 years and see how much God has grown me.

It's amazing. It really is. I read something I wrote and remember exactly what I was feeling when I wrote it...and then realize how different I was at the time.

So for that, I am thankful.

And, if I have learned nothing else over the last few years I have learned that God's timing is perfect...when He's ready...nothing will get in the way of His purpose. And so, I await His direction.