In the words of Usher, “These are my confessions..."

When I got laid off from my three-year teaching job, I decided to focus on pursuing my other interests, namely writing. That was almost two years ago, and I’ve done basically nothing about it. I realize that I need an outlet, and I'm not pushing myself as a writer. I thrive on a daily battle with words that forces my mind to be sharp and active. Will everything I post be astoundingly intellectual? Umm…I’d love it if you tell me that it is. I'm no Pulitzer winner, and I don't presume to be (even in my wildest dreams). I do want to write, and I've been making excuses to keep myself from doing it.

Top 5 excuses for not starting a blog:

5. All the good titles are taken.

But seriously...all of them. We're lucky our name fits into an idiom. We would've had no creativity if our name were something more complicated. Being the pun-loving people that we are, we had to explore all of our options. We had a few front-runners:  toogoodingtobetrue, sofarsogooding, ingoodingfaith. Aaaaand some we turned down instantly:  afatlotofgoodings, goodingfornothing, whatsgoodingforthegoose.

4. The last time I started a blog...

It ended badly. And by that, of course, I mean it didn't end at all. It's just hanging out there in cyberspace/simultaneously over my head...untouched. I had a pretty specific purpose (critiquing YAF), and once I wasn't teaching anymore, the drive for that kind of went out the window. Maybe now I should take that blog to children's books. Or maybe limit it only to board books as that's kind of my world as a nanny.

3. Nobody wants to read what I have to write.

Everyone feels this, I know. If you don't, you must be awesomely humble to go along with everything else you're good at doing!

2. I don't have original ideas.

This is a half-truth, and kind of crosses over reason #3. If I do have an original idea, I tell myself nobody would want to read it.

1. Everyone else is doing it.

I am completely ridiculous about this. I hate to start a blog because everyone else is doing it, and EVERYONE I know seems to have a blog. As I'm sure Chase would tell everyone, I do not do anything that someone makes me do. Tell me to do something, and I'll probably want to do it less.

Swallowing my pride about these issues and biting the bullet has been easier than I thought...we'll see how I feel in three months.