I told you I was trolling along the internet today, checking out different blogs and sources and whatnot. I am a bit ticky. I have certain places I check, and I frequently read the feedback and comments left by others.
If you go to Wishcasting Wednesday, you will see the Mr Linky gadget there, so you can input your name and your link to your direct post. The point of putting your link directly to the post you want to be read is more than a courtesy to people who may come along and want to read what you’ve written. Wishcasting is only one of many examples. Specifically with Wishcasting here, you want people to come to your wishing post so that they can comment and wish along with you.
I travel to many other sites, where you can comment and post, and leave your link to your direct post. I was trying to do that this morning. I had read the synopsis not only of the first post, but of the commenting post as well. It took me too darn long to find the first post, so long that I nearly didn’t bother. It was a bit easier to find the second post, but only because her posting had been more recent and she hadn't posted a great deal more since her supposedly linked post. There was no way to comment on the second post without reading the first post…because without that first post, the second one didn’t really make much sense. It did, but there were too many details unsaid if you didn’t read the first post.
I understand that the point of this online meandering here is to get people to come to your blog, to read what you’ve written. I do understand wanting to have more traffic, more exposure, more people who are interested in what you are doing. But I came to your blog to read one specific post…I did not come to wade through a great many other posts, fighting to figure out where your post that I would like to read went off to. Now, I do tend to stick around on blogs after I read an initial post, to read more, to learn more, to see what else there is being offered. But, if I come for one thing, I want to read that one thing first. I do not want to be frustrated by trying to figure out when did they write this, when did they post this, where do I go in order to find this.
It is merely a courtesy to the people who are trying to accept your invitation into your world, to link them to the correct post you want them to read, to link them to the post they are wanting to read, rather than linking them to your main blog and hoping they can flounder their way through things to get to what they want. Rarely do I bother on to find what I was interested in in the first place when things like this happen. Which is terrible, because the premise of these two posts above were worth the effort to read so that I could include them in the post I was planning to write anyway. If I can turn a spotlight on someone else and say, hey, check out what this person is saying, I love to do that, whether I receive credit for it or not.
Sometimes in the grand scheme of trying so hard to find yourself and to show others how you have found yourself so that they too might benefit from your hard work, it is a good thing to keep the other people in mind, rather than selfishly focusing entirely upon yourself and your own process. It is the little things, like linking directly to a particular post, that creates the conducive atmosphere of a continued journey together.
Having vented about this, I have utterly forgotten the post I was going to write. Jamie has been so beneficial for me, I was wanting to give out some other powerful resources to help people help themselves.
Maybe once I get something to eat and I can calm down again, I will come back and revisit the idea of these posts. Are you the master of your own life? Whose life are you living? Are you in control of your own life?
