22
May

Comment Challenge Day 22/23 - Highlighting a favorite/Explaining greatness

   Posted by: Greg Schwartz   in Bloggery, Professional Development

Gosh, I must just be getting cranky. I didn’t have anything for yesterday’s challenge and now I don’t want to complete today’s (or even tomorrow’s as written). It’s gonna be a long remainder of the month at this rate.

Today, we’re supposed to highlight a favorite comment, but I don’t want to do that, for the very same reason I didn’t want to pick a favorite commenter: I don’t want to discourage anyone who’s inclined or even tempted to leave a comment here. And I don’t want to tell you what makes a good comment (which is tomorrow’s challenge), lest it shape the way you leave comments.

Almost any comment left on this blog is a good comment in my book. I’m not about to start making qualitative judgments based on some set of arbitrary criteria that I conjure for the purpose of this challenge. I just appreciate that you take the time to say whatever’s on your mind. I try to respond in kind.

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6 comments so far

Christine Martell
 1 

grumpy commenters 

May 22nd, 2008 at 11:21 pm
Michele Martin
 2 

Greg (and Christine, too)–Don’t feel grumpy! The Challenge is supposed to be fun! Of course you’re both grumpy for different reasons, so let me say two things. First, Greg, writing about why you don’t want to do these two challenges is actually a learning experience itself, which is really the point of the Challenge–for us to think about these things. Some people will do the tasks and we’ll learn from those and others (like you will not) and say why not and we’ll learn from that. It’s all good because it’s all part of the learning.

And Christine–I know, you’re at the burnout stage. I definitely think a few days off–or even not finishing the Challenge right now–could be the thing that you need. This shouldn’t be some onerous, terrible thing. I do think in the future, though, that we should do shorter challenges, like 7 days. People seem to start to lose it by week two. I’d rather we end on a high, rather than everyone just wanting the thing to be over with!

May 23rd, 2008 at 5:54 am
Christy Tucker
 3 

@Michele, I think a 7-day challenge, or maybe a 2-week challenge with only 7 tasks (so you do it every other day) would be good. I think most of us don’t blog every day usually, so maybe something that doesn’t assume daily work would be easier to manage. I know I would have an easier time of it. When you did the 31-day blog challenge, I didn’t sign up because I knew it was a month where I couldn’t do things every day. I couldn’t invest that time, especially not over a whole month.

@Greg, I agree with Michele that just writing about why you’re choosing to skip these tasks is a valuable learning experience. This isn’t something you’re doing just because it’s too hard or “don’t wanna do it”; you have a thoughtful reason behind it.

@Christine, self-examination is a “thoughtful reason” too. You are the person best-equipped to know whether you’d learn more by pushing through the rest of the challenge or by taking a break and maybe finishing tasks later, at your own pace if they interest you.

May 23rd, 2008 at 7:50 am
Kevin
 4 

The other day I was thinking that 31 days is quite a stretch. I agree that 7 or 14 days might be a more reasonable period of time for most folks.
And, yes, it should be fun!
For the most part, this has been engaging, reflective and wonderful. It has been helpful to step away, consolidate some thoughts and consider coming back.
I have enjoyed both of you (Greg and Christine) in my rounds of blogs and comments.
Kevin

May 24th, 2008 at 6:07 am
Kevin
 5 

Challenge challenges 

May 24th, 2008 at 6:11 am
Greg
 6 

Hi all. Sorry I’ve been slow in responding, but I’ve been doing the long weekend thing here in the States and have limited computing time/access.

Thanks for the supportive comments. In some ways, I’m still behind the month-long challenge as it makes it REALLY seem like a challenge and thus more rewarding when we finally cross the finish line. But it has gotten grueling and kept me from doing any other blogging, which is probably not the best thing for my usual audience. Still worthwhile though, even if only to introduce me to a whole new group of engaged digital citizens (i.e., you).

May 25th, 2008 at 11:09 pm

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