Blogging on Christmas Eve feels a bit like shouting into a cave. It’s dark and lonely and no one’s listening. But don’t we all like to shout into caves sometimes? Isn’t it nice to imagine that you can say anything?

Regaining youth

When you’re young, you think everyone reads what you read. You think everyone will like what you write. You think it’s just a matter of finishing. It’s just a matter of doing your best. You don’t think about luck, or taste, or money. You just think about what you want, and what it will be like when you get it. Not all the potential obstacles in your way.

Maybe we need to be more like our younger selves.

The contradiction of “noise”

On the one hand, we are supposed to “make noise, be heard.”

On the other hand, we don’t want to “be part of the noise” or “get lost in the noise.”

As always, I suppose we have to figure out how to walk that fine line, how to find the right balance.

Consume, curate, or create

I think I read somewhere that there are 3 types of people on the internet (and perhaps, I would argue, in life): consumers, curators, or creators.

Consumers take it all in. They’re happy to click, browse, Like. They don’t need to blog or Instagram or get a million retweets in order to be happy or feel satisfied. They come, they see, they leave.

Curators are the reason we invited the Share button. And Pinterest. And Tumblr. They sift through the endless sites, pages, and posts to find the best stuff; they pan for gold. But their true fulfillment comes from sharing the treasures with their friends (real life or online). Spreading the wealth. And, like Robin Hood, gaining a name for it.

Creators, well, create. They write, photograph, design, investigate, report, innovate, sell. They make, so that you don’t have to. Sometimes it’s personal; sometimes it’s just business. (Sometimes it’s quality; sometimes it’s not.)

There’s no right or wrong here. It’s all personality. (And sure, you can be more than one, but odds are you lean in one direction more than others.) So the question is, how do you spend your time?

And, how do you want to be spending your time?

Happy holidays, y’all.


6 responses to “Another “mini-post sampler””

  1. linda Avatar

    Hehe, I’m blogging on Christmas eve too. Our family isn’t really huge on holiday traditions so it’s pretty much just WHEEEEEE NO SCHOOL/WORK!, like any other holiday. That said, merry Christmas! :)

    Gah, I can’t tell which one I am! I’d love to create more, but I’m lazy and I don’t do it much. Curating is fun, since I get to express myself with less effort, and I’m glad when I share stuff other people connect with. But I can also relate to the consumer because having a small audience doesn’t bother me much and I mostly lurk. Hm… I guess I’d like to edge over to the creator side of things more, but I’m not sure I want it enough to be willing to put in the effort. I’ll have to rethink how I spend my time in the new year…

  2. Shari Avatar

    I love that first one. Wouldn’t it be great if we could all retain just a little bit of our youthful innocence? It would so nicely offset everything that comes from growing up. ;-)

    Happy Holidays!

  3. Anthony Lee Collins Avatar

    I’m like Linda. For me this is pretty much a day off from work(! :-) ).

    Somtimes the creators and curators overlap a lot. I’m thinking of a friend who is a Wikipedia fanatic. I don’t know how many articles he’s created from scratch (some, I’m sure), but he’s revised and rewritten hundreds (maybe thousands), plus he’s taken a lot of photos which he’s uploaded. So, that’s really a mixture of creating and curating.

    I do all three, I guess, but creating is where I focus most of my energy, since the web is where my actual writing goes. But sometimes I curate, since sometimes I do posts of links that I think people will like.

    (Which is the original meaning of “blog” after all: a web log, a list of useful links that people have found.)

  4. Juliann Wetz Avatar

    Merry Christmas from someone reading from the cave.

    Your first paragraph stopped me. I think I did my best writing when I was younger (20’s). I think I took more chances. Or maybe I just thought I had something fresh to say. All I know is, I’m going to keep creating. I don’t think I could stop even if I wanted to.

  5. Kristan Avatar

    Linda and Anthony-
    Yup, I like all 3 roles too. So for me it’s a matter of evaluating how much time I’m spending in each, vs. how much time I *should* be spending on each.

    Shari-
    Yes it would! Being home (and babysitting my cousin’s 5 yr old) has really reminded me of that.

    Juliann-
    There’s definitely something to innocence/ignorance/naivete when it comes to art that allows you to be bold. They say it’s good to know the rules so you know when to bend them, but I think there’s something to be said for never knowing the rules at all.

  6. Jon Avatar

    Yes, write like everyone wants to read what you put down! That’s making it on my New Years resolution list.

    You already have a fan here!