Have a system

“Have a system,” is what our tutor at Teachers’ College used to tell us. “It doesn’t matter what system you use, as long as it works for you.”

That made sense to me. It still does 25-odd years after. I don’t know that I ever managed to apply it in my classes, but I’m going to try and put it into practice here. By ‘here’, of course, I mean this blog. Maintaining a blog has the potential to fulfill me. But it has to be done right. I need to set ground rules, so here they are.

Think, writing a little every day. I see myself devoting a year to the task and producing 365 little vignettes. ‘Little’ is the operative word. They short be short enough to read at a sitting. That is how thinking works too: you muse on one point at a time. Stitching multiple thoughts together into a sequence and forming a book or a philosophy is much more unnatural. (But I won’t rule that approach out.)

Okay, so I dream up a number of unconnected thought-splashes (not a stream), each being a self-contained post. How do I collate them? How do I keep them in order? What is the point? What is my goal?

Well, I use the blog as my desktop. I throw them down, slap them onto the canvas like Van Gogh, and let them mature. Eventually I’ll return to them. I’ll rewrite them, I may expand them slightly. And I’ll give each some tags. I might hyperlink them to related posts (of my own). Each time that I do that, I’ll update the date, so that they go to the top of the list. Which means that I’ll tend to revisit those posts at the foot that I haven’t recently read. That’s the spoon I’ll use to stir the pot. I’m counting on getting a little self-organization happening.

Of course, I’ll need to print them out. The whole Internet she-bang could go belly-up any day. And then where would we be? Better off, say some, but that’s as may be, and the subject of another entry.

I could edit and compose on paper just as well. If I do my alterations in red, and tick off with a green pen when I’ve made the adjustments on line, then that ought to satisfy any compulsive-obsessive bent I may have. Hey, it’s my system!

Initially I’ll need to scour my earlier notebooks and blogs for material I’ve already created. Waste not want not. Having done so, I’ll avoid the sensation of ‘here we go again!’ Been there, done that, déjà vu. There can’t we any question of being precious or exclusive. As they say—who?—every new idea is born drowning. So hold off with your judgementifications.

Now, as for the ultimate goal . . .