A struggle, introspection, reflection and a bit confusion and discomfort is natural and positive.

Searching for voice, salient content, attractive prose, angle of approach, meaning and motivation are the scars, rewards, highs and lows of growing.

Personally, I don’t factor in what others think about my subjects, I do focus on universally attractive aspects such as interesting writing style, composition, organization, clarity/brevity. Studying and reading damn fine writing is a must for the always aspiring blogger/communicator/thought leader/successful agent.

You’ve given me pause to self examine. Thanks.

A really insightful comment from someone who’s “kind of a big deal”.

@Jonathan

Still readin’ dude!

@BawldGuy

Quality people who are exceedingly good at what they do seem to become increasing humble. Jeff Brown is a man worth listening to.

Do it my way? Sure — but with professional guidance. I went from umpiring minor league Little League games to NCAA post season games in a relatively short time period.

Think I did it all my way? Yeah, right. We all do it ‘our’ way, but purposefully and consistently stubbing my toe in the dark, ain’t my idea of the most efficient learning curve. I learned from some real pros.

We get to do it our own way when we grasp and kinda sorta master the skills for that particular discipline. There just aren’t that many ‘naturals’ out there. And even naturals still learned from the truly experienced, no matter what they say.

Good stuff, Jon.

So I switched to my own blog and wrote as if I were talking to my clients or trying to provide the info that prospects might like to know. I share the portion of my personal life that I might share with a client (which means that not everything is shared). It worked for me, as 2008 was good. Prospects can decide if they don’t like me (they don’t call) or decide if they DO like me (they call). WYSIWYG

Not that I don’t enjoy the commraderie or knowledge gained from other agents, I just had to reset my priorities and evaluate the ROI to make sure I put food on my own table.

There are things I’ll write here at AG that I wouldn’t dare right on my regular blog. I’ve been far more introspective here than I’ll be there just because there are things – states of mind, emotions, etc. – that I want to share in case someone else feels the same that I don’t want in front of my regular audience.

If people link the two, so be it, but they will have to work for it.

I absolutely agree that there are some rather self-destructive things that appear on many blogs and, in spite of them, the agents continue to succeed. Or so it seems.

Irresponsible or not, that’s the direction my blog once had (or lack thereof) and that’s where I’m returning to some degree.

Once upon a time I wrote to an audience of one. And it was enjoyable and I received business from it. I’m still getting some business from writing to make the larger population happy, but I’m deriving less and less joy from the exercise.

The questions are fundamentally for any writer on their blog: does my content deliver a message, and what is that message. There is nothing wrong with advocating on topics that impact the whole, but if it only impacts a narrow margin of the collective then it really is just ego driven, and often irresponsible.

If the material is just another mood swing, chances are it was a waste of time both writing and reading it unless the reader is into reading diarys.

At the end of the day, I’m with what Jonathan has said in his last several posts that if it isn’t about business, then what’s the point? You might as well get yourself one of those webblogs on livejournal, because no ones wallet cares about the day the writer had.

It’s a pleasure reading your posts.