Perspective. Period.

This weekend I cried twice, and wondered if I should just quit blogging. I started wondering this after seeing exactly how many people read my posts from my Facebook page. This should not be allowed.I’m just saying, I have 482 “friends” on Facebook. And I invited, like, a hundred of those people to “like” my blog page, “Feels Like Home” too.Of those friends, exactly seven of them read my posts on average, but sometimes only two of them do. And of those people, one is my sister. And another is probably me. Which means sometimes, no one reads.So. There’s that.Yeah, yeah, there were those three that performed better than the rest, rising into the 38 click range, but I don’t want to BRAG so…You guys. I had over five hundred followers on my last blog, on Blogger alone. Plus thousands of clicks a week and I didn’t even do anything to promote it. And now, my eyebrows raise with excitement over 38?I’ve lost it, haven’t I?I’ve lost it, and I should just give up now. This is what I was crying about to my husband on Saturday afternoon.I may be the *teensiest* bit insecure."I just think if I had remotely interesting things to say, more than TWO of my friends on Facebook, would want to read." I wailed. “Don’t you think?” I went on, “Don't you think that’s as good an indicator as any? I’m probably no good at this."Jeremy just looked at me.“It’s just, I don’t want to be wasting my time” I said, trying to appeal to his logical mind. “Some of my family and closest friends don’t even read me. MY OWN FAMILY! MY BEST FRIENDS!” I shouted for emphasis.I got up to pour myself a glass of wine.“What if I’m the person who tries really hard but still, no one actually cares what I write? What if I just keep putting myself out there and no one says ‘hey, this is good, I’m going to tell my other friends about it.’ It would mean I’m not very good, right? RIGHT? You share things that are good. That’s what people do.”“Sweetie,” Jeremy said, "You haven’t been writing on your new blog that long.”I don’t know how this was supposed to help, but this was his response.“You know how many followers Glennon had after only two weeks of blogging, Jeremy? Forty two. I know this because in her blog post she said she yelled down to her husband and asked him how many followers Jesus had? And when he yelled back, “twelve,” Glennon yelled back giddily, “I have forty two!” Her husband cautioned her NOT to write that on her blog but she did. So this is how I know. And I also know from the comments that her friends were sharing her posts and emailing her blog link out to their friends and telling them why they should read it. They did this because Glennon is good. And I am not. This is what all this means, right?”“I understand that,” Jeremy said.Which helped NOTHING.“I think I’m going to give up.” I said.I said this, even though I know better. Because other people are not supposed to be the judge of my art, and I’m supposed to only care about how it makes me feel to create it because literally every artist knows we alone determine the value. What we think about what we do is all that matters. It's very idealistic. But, it’s hard to ignore the crickets. The crickets are loud as hell. If I poured my heart into developing the craft of writing and literally only SEVEN people only ever paid attention? Maybe I could have used that as a sign to start working on something else. Maybe writing alone is not my whole calling, but just a piece of it.HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO KNOW THESE THINGS?“I can’t be blind about this. I have to face reality. The people have spoken.” I said.Then I walked into the bathroom to pee.And just like that, the day made so much more sense…Good news, guys! I’m not a giant insecure, loser of a person who should quit writing forever.I’m just getting my period.But all this mess was not wasted. Because you know what else I realized? My target audience is a very narrow demographic. I write to mostly women between the ages of 25-40, with kids, who are thoughtful and love food and entertaining, who have an interest in doing life well and making the world a better place, who probably believe in God but are not “churched.” Did you know that? I didn’t until I wondered why more of my Facebook friends were not interested in my stories. Well, it might be because most of them do not fit this criteria. And maybe also because I haven’t gotten to writing about all the things I want to yet. The making the world a better place part, especially. So there were gifts in this doubting space for me. It allowed me to get clear on what I want to present here.What I’m trying to say is that despite what it looks like, I'm probably right on track with those seven people. I have nothing to complain about. There is no problem. I love those seven people, who might actually be six because one is me.I'm actually doing damn fine.Hi, you wonderful 6-7 people! I’m only focusing on you from now on. I’ll write my love letters straight to you.So now next month, I just need to remember.First comes the period. Then comes perspective.