I don’t get up at 5 am for everyone to listen to them drop knowledge on talk about social media, but I did for Jon Acuff while I was attending Blissdom this year. Jon hosted a 5Club Meetup and invited Blissdom attendees and the public to hear his speak. Either we were all nuts, half sleep or we really like Jon, because the room was packed with people looking for coffee and waiting for him to speak.

Here are a few of my takeaways from three pages of notes I took during the 5Club talk:

Give Yourself Some Grace

There is no rhyme or reason to good blogging. There will be that post you spend a ton of time working on and no one responds to it. Then there will be that post where you share a cat picture and everyone goes on and on about how profound it is. When it comes to writing, give yourself a little grace.

Keep Your Posts Short

Instagram, Twitter and Pinterest have shortened our attention span. People like reading in quick short bursts, so keep your posts short to keep their attention.

Make Friends Before Favors

Some of the things people do and ask for online they would never do in person. Friends will do favors for friends, so nurture and grow your online relationships before you start asking them to do things for you.

Grow a Community

Grow a community by joining other communities. You have to show up first before you can expect people to show up to yours.

I could go on and on, but these are a few I wanted to share.

Jon was also the closing keynote and again, I took about three pages of notes. One of the first things he said that resonated with me was, “When you refuse to hide your scars, they become a lighthouse for someone else.” I have found in this online arena that when you share a little of who you are, you find your people. Your kindred spirits. He also said, “You don’t have to fix yourself to share. Share before.”

This is something I appreciate about this community of people I see maybe once a year in person. We connect because we share and we do not judge each other. We have learned to give each other and ourselves a little grace.

Jon gave us a little advice about how to punch fear in the face:

1. Write down your voices.
2. Refute your voice with truth.
3. Share your voice with others.

We did an exercise where we wrote down what the voices were telling us, then we dismissed that crap as lies. When you are doing what matters in life, the voices of fear get louder, but we have to remember that fear is a liar.

The first time I heard Jon Acuff speak, he gave the entire audience his book Quitter. This time, he gave us an advanced copy of his new book, Start. I am a few chapters in and I am enjoying the book. The book talks about how every awesome life goes through five stages. You can pre-order the book and receive $250 worth of free stuff like videos, eBooks and audio lessons. How does that sound?!