The Top Five Ways Nakedpastor Stays Naked

This blog is in response to a contest going on over at problogger . Read and enjoy!

1. Persist: I believe in full-time nakedness. I believed that if I was naked long enough, people will eventually notice. I’ve been getting naked for over a year on my blog, frequently contemplated getting dressed, but because of my persistence it has paid off with a small collection of watchers. I’ve kept a paper journal for getting naked privately for 20 years, so getting naked publicly in my blog is au naturale for me.
2. Varietize: Before I really dove into nakedness I did quite a bit of research. I read anything from “Your blog has to be finely-focused to capture a reader” to “People want variety”. I’m a pastor, writer, musician, artist, family man, outdoor sportsman, party-animal, whatever. So, instead of just baring my brain, my heart, my artistic side, or my pastoral side, I decided to take it all off. I’m going to show everything! People seem to be responding positively to it.
3. Be myself: My blog name is, after all, “nakedpastor”. I try (and still have a long way to go) to be as transparent and real as possible. I often feel quite vulnerable being so naked in front of so many people. My initial thought was to encourage other pastors to get naked… to throw off the heavy burdens of quenching their personalities, hiding their struggles and fulfilling other people’s expectations. As a result, I have many other kinds of people that read my blog who appreciate and believe in nakedness.
4. Nurture: I’m not into exhibitionism, but into actually encouraging others to be real. So, from the very beginning I decided that even though my blog was online and could easily be non-personal, I decided that I was going to respond as much as I reasonably could to each and every comment made. It’s one thing to be naked in front of unseen strangers. It’s yet another to get naked in front of people who know you! I even worried about my own church finding out some unsavory things about me. But I wanted to form real relationships, not a collection of superficial readers. As my traffic increased, along with the comments, I decided that I would shoot off a personal email to first time comment-makers welcoming them and inviting them into correspondence with me. I still try to do that. On top of that, if anyone makes a really remarkable comment, I try to respond personally to it. I also engage people within the comment section of the blog itself if I think it needs it. I’ve made some very interesting connections and even made friends. In fact, my readers have helped me to get even more naked than I ever dreamed. Honesty encourages honesty.
5. Minimalize: I used to have adsense and other advertisements on my blog. I didn’t like the way it looked, and the ads often didn’t compliment the content of my site at all. It was like I was claiming to be naked but was carrying around a sandwich-board advertisement or balloons peppered with ads. So I decided, after reading some of gapingvoid and problogger (an interview with someone who published an online book I think), that I would trust that over time income would generate indirectly from my blog through other means. It hasn’t happened yet, but I really think some day it will. I love the critiques that I get about my blog such as, “uncluttered”. Yes! Is there any other way to be naked?