The past week and a half, I have removed
myself from social media, not completely but quite a bit. God has been
working within me and molding me into who He needs me to be. I've had
to come to terms with a lot of things, face some traits that I'm not
happy with, and allow Him to shape and remove what needs to be gone.
I've started noticing a huge different within me, in the way I see
things, the world, the people around me and what I think is important.
One
thing He has been pushing me to do more of, is focus on my blog. I
don't know why I fight it so much, there seems to be a wall of
some kind stopping me from investing fully back into what I love. Where years ago I couldn't wait to log on and get writing, nowadays I fight it, I block it, I think "why do I need to? What am I even going to talk about, since no one really pays attention to blogs anymore."
It's sad to admit that to myself and to you all, right here on this little corner that I created back in 2006.
I hope you're ready for a heart to heart, because I'm about to just talk and talk and talk your ears off. If you're not in the mood for a long post, that's ok, you can click off and go do something else. I just need to get this off my chest, and onto this online journal.
How is that for a throwback? Sandra circa 2006, 32 years old and fresh faced.
Almost 20 years ago, I wrote the very first words on Diary of a Stay at Home Mom. I had no clue what I was doing, but I felt a pull to a community of like minded women.
It was a Monday, the 6th of February of 2006. I sat down, opened up Blogger and off I went. You can read that first post here, I titled it Well I finally did it, got my own blog!
I was a new mom, not married for very long, and really enjoyed talking with, reading up on, and engaging with others who just like myself, had little kids and were navigating motherhood.
I loved every minute of it, I shared everything, I showed my children, I made posts about what we were eating, what I was buying, what I created, what I watched, what I read, what my children said or did at school or at home. We joined together, chit chatting, sharing recipes and ideas. We had the cutest features that we all loved participating in. For example:
Menu Plan Monday - hosted by Laura at Organizing Junkie
Tackle it Tuesday - hosted by 5 Minutes for Mom
Works for me Wednesday - Rocks in my Dryer
Slow Cooking Thursday - hosted by myself here at Diary of a Stay at Home Mom
Show and Tell Friday - hosted by Kelli at There's no place like home
There were blogs that I followed religiously, that I loved engaging with. Each one bringing something different but yet keeping the circle tight.
Then years started passing, some blogs dropped off, deleted, others stopped updating, some of the women I knew lost loved ones, got sick, started new blogs, ended those blogs as well and some made the move to social media. And that is where I truly believe that things derailed. Social media!
This big new thing that was supposed to make things even better, but in my honest opinion, ended up being the end of a beautiful community. Blogs turned into money making machines, littered with ad after ad, monetized links popping everywhere. They lost the simple, familiar, homey look and feel they had, and became commercialized.
I held on.
I promised myself that no matter what happened, come hell or high water, I refused to change the look and feel of my blog. Maybe that is why to this day, almost 20 years later, my blog remains the same. Same name, same look, still simple, nothing fancy or weird, no blogs telling you how to blog, how to write, what you should say or do. That was such a huge turn off for me. Stop telling people how to speak from the heart and talk about their lives. It was so weird to see.
Then I started changing. Curt retired from the military and our life was thrown upside down. We moved back to Idaho thinking that is what we wanted, only to realize that it had changed so much and it no longer felt like home to us. We moved to Texas, we bought a home, the kids grew up, and suddenly life was just a jumbled mess. I no longer wanted to pick up the camera and record all that I was doing. I no longer felt like what I had to share was of any interest, and besides, who would I share it with? Most of us old bloggers were either not blogging anymore, or like I said, had moved onto Facebook and Instagram.
I didn't fit in and I didn't know if I wanted to anymore.
But through all of this, I would pray and ask God what to do, where to go, I mean, I love cooking and homemaking and being creative, and needed an outlet. I tried Instagram, I posted daily stories and had a lot of good feedback, many sent me messages telling me how much they loved following me, how I inspired them to love being homemakers. I thought that was it, I had found my niche. But no, it wasn't and as time as gone by, I feel more and more removed from it. Again, the feeling that everything is so commercialized. I just share my life, while the big influencer accounts ruin it in my opinion. Suddenly everyone wants to live the same way, do the same things, buy the same items. It's just too much for me.
In the background was God, constantly in my ear. "Get back to your blog, get back to what you love, share my word there, share your life, continue what you started, that is where I want you." I would hear it, I would try to follow it and immediately fall off the wagon because I wasn't feeling it.
This has been going on for years, my friends. Years of fighting it, years of not wanting to listen. I am still not 100% in, if I am to be brutally honest. I just don't know what to do, I miss blogging, but I miss the old blogging. I listen to God and do what He tells me to in every other area of my life, so why is this area so difficult to be obedient in? It's something I am still working through and trying to understand.
But, over the past few weeks, I have felt more and more disconnected from social media. I'm tired of the mindless scrolling, the overbearing reels on Instagram, the competition, the comparison, the nastiness, the rude comments and messages, just everything. I think I am reaching my boiling point with social media in general. I just want snap my fingers and go back to simpler times.
So here I am, after this long drawn out super chatty post. If you're still here reading, thank you, I did warn you it would be long.
The past 2 or so weeks, I have been dealing with all these thoughts and feelings, trying to put them all together, trying to just listen to what God is saying and not fighting Him or arguing back. You know a lot of times our biggest breakthroughs come when we stop trying to do things ourselves and allow God to move in.
I have been mindlessly living life but not feeling myself, not the true Sandra I used to be before 2012.
What does this mean? Well, I have no clue. I don't know where I'll go from here, or what it's going to look like. There are just a few things I am certain of. I will not delete my blog, I WILL listen to God's nudging, and I need to get back to basics and being myself. This really is a journey y'all. I feel like I've talked about this before, or mentioned it in passing in other posts. Start blogging again, stop blogging again, miss blogging again, ignore blogging again. Never ending annoying cycle that I want to break.
I love blogging, always have and always will, and I was truly the happiest I have ever been, when I was doing this blogging thing every day. It motivated me, it kept me content. I have so much to share with you all, I feel like I haven't even showed you everything about my home, I tend to keep the pictures very much contained to the kitchen or living room. I do want to share more, cook more, create more.
If there's one thing I have learned the past few weeks, is that life is so precious. One minute you're here, the next you're gone. Why not live each day to the fullest? Why not do the things that I love? Why?
It's time. It's time to face the inevitable and make a decision, and then stick with it. Am I ready for it?
Not even close, but oh well.
Here goes nothing.....
