I find myself ruminating tonight about ‘toiling away in obscurity.’ And just as I type those words, I think I know where this rumination ends, but before skipping to the end…
I just. I post this blog—these journal entries, because that’s what they are—online. It is public, you know? But I don’t make any effort to otherwise get the word out there about it. I don’t do any SEO, I don’t go around posting links, sharing, social media, marketing, etc. I literally don’t do anything to drive traffic here…and so this site gets no real traffic. A couple visitors a day, and I’m pretty positive those are 90% just bots, you know? The filters can’t get them all, and since it’s really the only traffic I get here, it seems outsized.
Same thing with Film School, the podcast I do with Josh. I don’t do anything to push that podcast…and so, like this site, we basically don’t have any listeners for it. The reality of the vastness of the internet is that you can’t just throw something up and think that people are going to find it. They won’t. You have to put effort and smarts into it. I know this.
And, it’s interesting, I think there’s an allure to toiling away in obscurity. First, there’s the romantic thought of being ‘found.’ We’re lonely little secrets, hiding in the forest, and what a thrill it would be if the beautiful princess or handsome prince were to come along, scoop us up, and carry us off to the kingdom like the prize we are. If I put it out there, someone just might find it and make my dreams come true.
Underneath that fantasy, I think, is a defense mechanism. Resistance wins just a little bit when we act that way because, rationally, we know that’s not the way it works. And the romance of it all actually saves us from actually putting real work in, actually putting ourselves and our vulnerabilities on the line where people can actually see them…and therefore everything can, in truth, stay the same, even though we feel like we’ve done the work, done something. ‘I put it out there!’ we can say to ourselves. …but we didn’t really, did we? Not really.
Here’s the end of the thread that I caught up to right as I was proposing the topic at the start: it really depends on what my intentions are, doesn’t it? If it’s my writing, my books, for example, the above majorly applies, particularly the last bit about realizing that I’m not really putting my work out there. I need to get my rear in gear and figure out new behaviors. Figure out this desire to stay hidden and work on it. But…for this blog? For the podcast? Hmmm. I think I’ve come to realize a long time ago that both of those two projects I’m always running in my life are NOT because I need the world to see them. There’s a contradiction there, certainly, because I do post them online, which means I do harbor a desire for them to be seen…but I’ve genuinely realized that’s not the main reason I keep doing those activities.
This blog is about me getting ready for bed each night. That’s the main objective here. Not views. And I do post these journal entries online because I do always have a desire to be seen and get positive attention. Occasionally, it does, and that sustains me. The drip drip trickle is enough to keep me here, and I don’t need more than that. Obviously. This is day #4000-plus.
The podcast BY FAR is mostly about spending time with my best friend, watching a movie together and talking about art. We record it because it makes it a project, and we’re both project guys. It increases the likelihood of us seeing each other by 1000 percent. And that includes posting it online for the same reasons as the blog—we’re only ever occasionally ‘found,’ but that has been enough to sustain us. I also get the education and practice out of doing the podcast, learning about great storytelling, and practicing over and over, on the fly, every episode, doing a detailed breakdown of its story structure and themes.
Of the two…the podcast definitely would be the activity I could see myself putting some effort into trying to actually go and find an audience. I haven’t had the room in my life to do that yet, but maybe I will at some point in the future. It’s a good podcast. I think people would like it. But, that would take time and effort. It always does.
We’ll see.
Night night.