Writing can be so effortless at times … and then there are other times where it is next to impossible. The last two months have proven to be very lean writing months for me personally and I am very disappointed by it for lots of reasons. As I’ve said before, the idea of writing often is to help me keep track of thoughts and put little time stamps on ideas. I’ve done two One Post a Day challenges in the last year and they have both kicked my ass — they’ve left me angry, inspired, exhausted, and so much in between that I really don’t know if it is good for me or not. I like the idea of challenging myself, but I am also very aware of what it does to my psyche … it pushes me to compose and post things that require a lot of thought and effort and while that is a good thing the larger impact is daunting. But like I said, writing often is personally important. I’m thinking I need some inspiration.

So when my friend and colleague, Allan Gyorke, left a comment on my last post about the idea of a “One X Per Day Challenge” for the month of July I thought it might be an interesting experiment. What the “X” consists of is really up to you. On one hand I like the idea of building, sharing, creating something every single day for a month, but on the other I fear I might have a tendency to mail it in. Folks like D’Arcy and Alan do the amazing one flickr post a day and I know they rarely mail it in, but I wonder if I would simply bail on it somewhere in the middle and start posting crap. I just don’t know. I know the one thing that really pushes me is writing, so I wonder how creating other forms of stories would treat me.

Maybe it would be as rewarding and exhausting — just in different ways. Either way, if I do engage in it I’ll want to set some ground rules. I would also want to use my blog as the place where I keep track of the contributions — and if I do that well, each entry might look more like a reflection of the artifacts instead of just a simple pointer to it. As I sit here and write about the idea I am coming around to it. It would force me to think about different ways to share, it would push me to participate every day, and it would let me engage in some real reflective activity while I work to make sure it lives on in my personal space. This is sounding better … anyone up for a challenge?