Making Sense - what's Simon doing writing a blog?
This website has been live for 22 months now and I as you can see, there's nothing to show for it. Off to a great start.
I had privately "worked" on daily posts for about two months at the very beginning of 2023 and had even published about 25 blogs but told no one about them. The blog was live and if you Googled it, the stuff was there but I hesitated on advertising this project (I'll eventually get into why that happened). The project went dead for a solid year and half.
I figure this time around I should "share" it so to a) do what the blog was intended to do and b) if it's public, maybe I'll be more inclined to keep writing.
So where did all this come from? Since my college years, I've been compiling a library of bookmarked pages of articles, videos, resources etc. and finally thought to myself, maybe I should share this. I asked myself - would anyone be helped, encouraged, educated, edified, etc. if I brought the years and years of reading, exploring and compiling to life - why not share it?
The goal is simple: help others make sense of the world. If something strikes me as interesting, encouraging, thought-provoking, helpful, educating - it gets saved and published. The goal is that the sum total of the blog will be a library of content that makes the reader better off for stumbling upon it.
Topics will have a wide range but the ultimate criteria for posting content will be two-fold:
1) Does it interest me? If I can't genuinely sit back and say that the content connected with me, it'll be disingenuous to the reader of this blog. The point is to find the esoteric, the rabbit hole, the thought provoking, the long-form essay etc. I am not here to post clickbait or straight news or even fake news for that matter.
I have found that the majority of successful writers, bloggers, content producers etc. are not trying to please the masses. Their readership values them most as content producers when they are being their most authentic selves.
If you want two great examples, look at Seth Godin (https://seths.blog/) and Paul Graham (https://paulgraham.com/articles.html) blogs. Both writers get tremendous viewership for sharing their thoughts and their thoughts alone. I don't read either to ingest rehearsed cliches or down the middle "safe" opinions. I go to both writers because they are absolutely authentic in their thinking. If I share with a similar ethos with "what's interesting to me", my hope is that it ultimately edifies you the reader in ways being safe, comfortable or easy never would.
2) Does the content help the reader makes sense of the world both big and small?
I look at the world around us and I find myself asking more and more: what on earth is going on? If I'm asking that question, I am sure other people are and I hope the content shared helps make sense of what's going on around us. Some of the content is niche and only speaks to a single topic, company, person or event. Other content will speak to humanity, the meaning of life and living life "well". In both regards, I am trying to help build a coherent understanding of the world around us that is not purely emotive or purely rationale. C.S. Lewis spoke of defining and describing the world around us with out ascribing particular value judgements to the topic discussed. This blog is an attempt at just that.
Three undergirding beliefs behind the blog:
1) I am a Christian and profess faith in Jesus Christ. My worldview is set upon the belief that Jesus is God, Jesus died on the Cross for our sins and Jesus bodily rose from the grave. That's the Gospel and the hope is that the content will land on the side of "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things" (Philippians 4:8).
2) This blog will do it's best not to post controversial topics for the sake of spinning people up. I'd much rather discuss matters of truth and falsehood, good and evil, wisdom and folly. I will try to do the latter by not avoiding hard matters but by doing so in a way that gets to the heart of issues without making value judgements of the people involved.
3) I needed to bookmark a lot of this content so to clearly stake out what I believe, what interests me (and as importantly, what does not) and what I need to learn more about. The journey to explore, grow and learn is a chase. There's no finish line I'm aware of. We are all works in progress.
My favorite musician is Steve Moakler. Steve has a song called "Crooked Heart" (recommend a listen) and the chorus goes:
I'm just trying to walk a straight line with a crooked heart inside
I don't do what I want to but I want to all the time
Even with my best foot forward that leaves one left behind
Trying to walk a straight line with a crooked heart inside
That's all this blog is trying to figure out....how to walk a straight line in life knowing we are a tad bit messier/"crooked" than we hoped.
The articles, resources, essays are all curated with the intention of informing, refining, encouraging and educating the reader on that journey.
Final parting thought: I finish most/if not all of my emails with "all the best". That's my hope and prayer for anyone who finds their way onto simonwatrous.com. Whatever point you are in life, all the very best to you.
Let's get started. See you tomorrow.
All the best,
Simon Watrous