I was thinking what I would have posted if not for this challenge. I am not sure how much it would have been but I AM sure what I would NOT have posted. At least 75%.

I am rather certain that 75% of what I posted would never have seen daylight. Maybe I would have written some of them (although not many I am sure) but then instead of hitting the publish button I would have pushed the button ‘save draft’. And would have never published it.

Many times it felt like rambling. And most of the time I did not do the post I had planned to do. Because of time pressure and not being satisfied with what I wrote about the subject I wanted to write about, I often had to write whatever came to mind at first.

And strangely enough it often went by itself. I just started to type and 10 minutes later I had a blogpost. Searching for a suiteble picture, that kind of expressed my blogpost, took often more time than the writing itself.

And thinking about that subject was also no problem, because I did not really think about it. I just started. And really loved it most of the time.

Except for some moments, that I had enough of the pressure of posting every day. And thought of quiting, because so what! No need to do it anyway. But I am very happy I went on with it.

But even more happy that it is over now. From now on I can again post when I want and if I do not feel like it, well then not.

And I can now go on with my new selfhosted blog, MindStructures, really look foreward to do that. And again spent more time on making graphics, construction and navigation part than on the writing.

But I am really so very glad the writing did go so much easier this month. Because no matter what, it is the only way to get my thinking clear.

But it was worth it, because I can now make screenshots, opened another account and weblog and found a way to easy comment on other blogs. So many great advantages because of one clear moment.

That moment came this morning when I was being unhappy with all of the commenting thing I wrote about yesterday. I still was not able to comment in an easy way on Blogger, although I found some more ways to comment, like Intense debate like someone suggested. But on Blogger that was no possibility.

And I also found a blogpost yesterday about Gravatar and the question why it still is not mainstream. I wish it was, but as it is not, I had to deal with that. And thought about another way to comment.

Then suddenly I had a clear moment. Why not signing up for a Blogger account. My first thought was that I would have to get a blog there, and as I have already so many and even started a whole new selfhosted WordPress blog, one that I did not have time to post to yet, it would be illogical.

But maybe I could just make an account so that I could easy comment on Blogger. That seemed like a very simple idea, what would be easy to do.

So I did. And it worked perfect. I had a photo uploaded, I could use my own name. Brilliant!

Then when I was almost finished I thought to just look how Blogger works. And it seemed not to complicated so thought, well just make another blog there, make one page where I can put links to my other blogs.

When I looked at the empty page of a brand new blog, I suddenly wished that I could make screenshots. I always liked screenshots and if I saw one I always wished I could do that too. But I never knew how, think I tried sometime but as it did not immediately work I must have stopped it, as I am not that patient.

But now I googled screenshots and got a page take-a-screenshot where it showed very clear how to do it. Well, that most have been the most easy thing I have ever learned. One click, past it and it is done!

Although it got a bit more time consuming after that, as I wanted to have all the screen shots the same size, but in essence it was amazingly easy. And because I could already work with Paintnet, it was not to difficult to adjust the sizes.

Then I copied them on that new blog and have a sort of landingpage of my Bloggeraccount with all my blogs and twitter accounts together. I like the landingpage actually and might make even a more compact one an other time.

And last but not least, I can comment on all Blogger blogs a whole lot easier. At least I hope so.

But still that was not enough to leave a comment on a Blogger weblog. I had tried that more often, but always failed. So now I thought to handle it directly and looked what the different accounts are that let you leave a comment on those blogs.

There were several possibilities. There were accounts that were linked to blogging platforms. One of them, WordPress, would be no problem as I have my own account there. But I did not want to use my account name, I wanted to use my own name. And it seems that it does not work like that. And leaving a comment with Gravatar was not possible.

Well, I thought okay lets make an account that I can use every time I want to comment on those blogs in the future. So I tried some different ones, like AIM and another but somehow got stuck.

Then the next was Google, I signed up for an account, had a picture, left my weblog and thought it should work. But it did not and the comment did not get through. But I could get the page back and get a preview. But when I clicked on the link it brought me to an aboutpage of Blogger, which said there was no such account. No I don’t, but I already know that myself. I did make a Google account but that was not shown. So somehow I think the Google account was meant to be a Blogger account.

And that are only the problems on Blogger. On other blogs where I want to comment you can sometimes use Gravitar or Twitter, but not always and then I need Disqus or something like that. Which I think I have an account from, but actually I am not sure anymore.

I wish there was one, just one online profile to make with one password and one picture that I could use whenever I want to do whatever I want. Make blogs, participate on forums, leave comments and so on. Because by now I have about a million passwords and accountnames that I can hardly remember.

But maybe it is good for memory training and one account and password would also be rather dangerous I guess. So I struggle on and try to remember which password goes with which account.

If I take all the signs, there are 3 fire signs that I can call spirit.

The one I called yesterday ‘objective personal spirit’ in my version of Integral theory, was called ‘primordial spirit’ in my previous mentioning of Zodiac models.

There are three different signs that can be called spirit: Impulsion, Expression and Vision (resp. aries, leo and sagittarius)

Impulsion (aries) is the first fire sign which is just that, an impuls nothing coordinated or intentional. That is different from the second fire sign Expression (leo) which is the discovery of the indiviual self that has to be expressed. And finally the third fire sign Vision (sagittarius) is the ego that finds out there is a world beyond his own individual self.

Impulsion (aries) = primordial spirit / objective personal spirit

Expression (leo) = individual spirit / subjective personal spirit

Vision (sagittarius) = universal spirit / subjective impersonal spirit

So that means there is one that can be seen as objective (Impulsion) and two that can be seen as subjective (Expression and Vision). And there are two that can be seen as personal (Impulsion and Expression) and one that can be seen as impersonal (Vision).

(In my post Trying to understand each other, I write how and why I use the Integral terms ‘objective, subjective, personal and impersonal’ and the Zodiac terms ‘primordial, individual and universal’).

I am tying to get the difference clear between objective and subjective, yin and yang, male and female, positive and negative, active and passive, mind and soul, body and spirit. Are they all two sides of the same coin, or is it more difficult.

In the Zodiac there are 4 signs that reflect it best I think (at this moment) so I uploaded those with a general description. The other 8 signs are not included yet because it would be to complicated at this point. So for now it are just the 4 cardinal signs of the Zodiac, aries/libra and capricorn/cancer.

Without actually thinking about real humans, I think it can be seen as male/female positive (impulsion/reflection) and male/female negative (construction/emotion).

Male/Female positive (spirit/ mind)

Impulsion (aries, primordial spirit)
Activity that is self-motivated, unaffected by others. New beginnings, the start of new cycles, birth, vitality. Aggressive, willful, assertive. Focused in short bursts, unlikely to sustain interest in the long term. Adventurous, pioneering, warrior-type energy, impatient, works best alone. Unconcerned with approval or acceptance. Lacks persistence and stamina. Honest and forthright.

Reflection (libra, individual mind)
Individual entering into relationship with others, partnership. One-to-one relationships. Meeting others as an equal, interdependency. Encountering repressed part of yourself through others. Going beyond ego boundaries. Peace, harmony, balance, social awareness. Learning how to get along with others, treating others as equals. Art, beauty, harmonious surroundings, distressed by inharmonious interactions. Dialogue, debate, conflict, enemies, justice.

.

Male/Female negative (body/soul)

Construction (capricorn, universal body)
Bring about the perfect society. Making practical, efficient connections with others on the physical plane. Ambitious, feels pride in accomplishments. Reality, hard facts. Relationship to authority. Serious, determined, disciplined, focused. Fathering, disciplining love. Authority figures. Seeks certainties in life. Want things in concrete. Concerned with the practical relationships to support yourself within society. Not interested in blue sky ideas, needs to bring theory into concrete reality. Knowing the rules and playing the game.

Emotion (cancer, primordial soul)
Nurturing, support, emotional bonding, belonging, roots, source. Ground of your being. The unconscious, feelings, emotion, first emotional attachments to the world. Mothering, emotional and physical nurturing. Experiences and imprinting during infancy and childhood. Family, ancestors, heritage, relationships to the past. Belonging, feeling at home, caring. Feeling supported, that needs are provided for. Insecurities and fears if your needs haven’t been fulfilled.

I have no time to think anymore, to get it all in line with what I wanted to do anyway with this blog.

I feel all I do is just rambling. There is no structure, no coherence, it all is nothing but loose pieces put together. And I am really wondering why I continue then. And not just stop.

But something deep inside me says I just have to finish the month. For no other reason than because I started it. And that should be enough to finish the blogging month of writing a blogpost every day.

The blogpost I was writing today had a lot of things I wanted to say in it, but when I read it out loud (well not to loud because it sounded real silly) I had no idea anymore what I was actually saying.

So I just saved it as a draft. Maybe I will finish it some other time. When I had more time to think about it.

But another week or so and then the month is over.

And then I can finally go on with my new blog and start searching for templates, colours, plugins and so on.

And just write when I feel like it. Maybe not even more then once a week!

Was the post of yesterday, writing with flow, ready in about five minutes, today it took me a whole lot longer. Acutally it is almost midnight and I still have nothing on paper that flows.

But that does not mean that I find the subject I wanted to write about not interesting. In fact I find it very interesting and can hardly stop thinking about it today. Maybe it is something that has been talked about often already, but to me it was very clarifying.

While talking about flow in writings on a forum yesterday, there were many reactions that were really interesting. One of them was about the difference between writing a personal essay, writing an interview and writing a review, where the review appeared to be the hardest to do.

At first I thought, okay but why is that so difficult. Is it like with all other subjects that you can write about, what is difficult for one is easy for another, and of course the other way around?

Or is it difficult for another reason?

And the more I think about it, the more I indeed think it is difficult for another reason.

So I tried to visualise what I think the differences are. And for that I used my adjusted model of Integral theory.

And if I would have to differentiate the three writings I would come up with the following:

- Personal: personal subjective
- Interview: personal objective
- Review: impersonal subjective

So what is missing here, is the impersonal objective.

But that is easy to see. That is what in general is all the writing about ‘the world’ in general. History, science, everything you learn at school actually. Most of that is written in an impersonal objective way.

And opposed to that, at the other side, is the personal writing. Which can be about personal feelings, about children, family. But also about personal achievements or passions.

But in between there is something else. And that is writing about other people.

Which can be done of course in many different ways, but in essence I think there are two basic groups: that what can be observed and giving your own opinion.

The first I will call personal objective. It can be an interview with the person, or making pictures and let those do the story. Or others tell you something and you use that.

But the second basic group is what I wanted to write about actually (so many words further and I still did not get to the point), which I will call here: impersonal subjective.

And that is the group that is about the ‘review’. Writing about another person. About the achievements of another person and give your own vision about that.

And I think that is the most difficult thing to do. Well, that is if you want to do that with respect and without projecting. I think that only can be done if indeed you did form an honest opinion and doing that after getting your own ego out of the way.

Which is maybe even a more interesting subject for a blogpost. But now I have to post this one, it is almost midnight and the NaBloPoMo challenge is not over yet. So I will just press publish now!

I just can not seem to find the right way to do that. Writing purely from myself seems a lot like rambling. And integrating thoughts of others make me stumble and struggle. So the blogpost I found today about How to write with flow, was exactly what I needed.

My very first problems are indeed when I do the following.

Read your writing aloud. I don’t care what you’re writing. It could be a press release, it could be website copy, it could be the latest chapter of that novel you’ve been writing for the last five years. Read it aloud. Read every single word.

I often end up totally cluttered with words when I read aloud. Which means probably that I do not do it enough.

We’re looking for flow. When you read aloud, you’ll find certain sentences don’t sound right. Your tongue trips over them. You lose track of what you were trying to say. You find that the comma you inserted in the middle there makes you sound like you have a mild speech disorder. All of these things are problems with your flow.

Yes, the commas, big problem. But maybe I should just get my sentences shorter.

This is what reading aloud does for you. It is practice in flow. So read aloud. If you catch yourself skipping words, take them out of the draft. If you catch yourself substituting one word for another or rearranging the grammar in your head, make the correction.

This is what I find, by far, the hardest thing to do. Finding the right words. Finding the word that says what I mean to say. Maybe it is a foreign language thing, but even in Dutch I have those problems while writing.

Do not, I repeat, do not trust yourself to remember where the problems are when you’re done reading. Edit as you go, and make your edits. Then read it aloud again.

Indeed something I find out again and again. And one of the things I am doing better, now that I forced myself to write a blogpost every day for a month.

The month is not over yet, so maybe there is still hope to have some flow before I start my new weblog. And finally use writing as a way to structure my mind, instead of breaking my head about writing.

Then in the second post, The Subject of Beauty, I try to place art in the system I am trying to develop about the similarity between Integral theory and the Zodiac and in my last post about it, Aesthetic theory, I try to analyse art to see what it is and what it is not, using words based on my own understanding.

So now I am trying to find the place it has in Integral theory and the Zodiac (most recent post on that theory is Trying to understand each other) to see what can be a definition that is broad enough to cover art and precise enough to differ it from other parts of life.

I saw an essay about Integral with a graphic where the sciences all have a place in the four quadrants. I did not read the whole essay yet because it was about Integral and Religion and my interest at this point is in the connection with art.

But I did take all the words that were used there, just to see how they fit.

In the objective personal area are physics, chemistry, cognitive, molecular biology, botany, neurology and behaviourism.

All those share the basics of being objective measurements of reality. What is also measurable is in the column objective impersonal. Those are astronomy, geology, ecology, environmental, political, economics, sociology and linguistics.  I am not sure yet what the differences are exactly, but at this point I just leave it at that.

In the subjective personal column are developmental psychology, developmental structuralism and interior phenomenology. And in the subjective impersonal column are ethnomethodology, anthropology and cultural studies.

At this point I do not have a clear understanding of each word that is used here, so I will look those all up to see why each might be in the column they are in. That will be my next goal, before I look at where art fits in best.

When I searched for a domainname and a host for my blog, I had the choice between several webhosts. My main interest, of course, had one that said to be one click and all done. I like that a lot.

But that would be more expensive that using the webhost that I already had, it was a cheap but good one. I have a website there that I set up some years ago and which was a real good learning experience.

And after that I managed to get another blog hosted there. So I thought I could do it again now and already got the new name and login information by email.

So okay, I had a look to see how far I would get. First to the WordPress.org page to download the blog. You get very confident if you see it at first. Five minute installprocess.

Well, if you add it all together it is more like a five HOUR installprocess. That is, to me it is. It was becoming clear to me very soon again, when I read instructions, especially so many and looking so complicated, I get totally frustrated and simply get stuck.

Others may find it very easy but not me. So what now. I wished I had taken the one step hoster, but he, I didn’t. Deal with it!

Now this was the situation and I could choose to wait and start all that another time. But then I would be thinking all the time that I could not get it done. So I continued.

Then I remembered a video I watched when I started with my previous selfhosted blog. I was a free to watch series of ten or so videos that show you step by step how to set up a blog. But what was it called again!

I could not remember at first, but with a little searching on Google I found it again (I must have favoured it too, but had no idea where, so looking on Google is faster) and started straight on with video 4, how to install WordPress. The previous steps of a domainname and a webhost I did already so I could start the installing.

When I watched the video it all came back again. And having done every step before made it a bit easier and more comfortable this time. But still, not exactly a 5 minute process. I started at 7 this morning and now, 3 hours later, all I have is the default page, so nothing more than I would also have had if I opened a WordPress.com blog. But the main difference is that this really is my blog, ‘mindstructures.com’, instead of ‘mindstructures.wordpress.com’.

Which has all the potential to become what ever I want it to be (being overly positive, there will be many setbacks, I am sure) and I really love that phase. So at this point I leave it at that. Because if I would go any step further I know that I can not be stopped again and will be busy searching templates, mixing colours, finding plugins, discover widgets, making layouts until deep at night.

So for now, I love the bleu colour of the default page and the text that says: Hello World!