So far I have found writing this blog a useful exercise. It’s an age old therapy technique, write a letter to someone telling them how you feel but don’t send it – the idea being I think, that you marshal your thoughts and follow things through to understand what is really going on in your mind. It’s also an outlet for frustration, without having to inflict pain or worry on anyone else, in which there is an undeniable freedom. Blogging is very similar, until people you know start to read your blog.
For me, a blog is a waste of time if it isn’t honest and open. As I have mentioned before, if you are going to lie or sugar coat things you might as well be a fiction writer, basing a story loosely on your own experiences and while you’re at it have a huge artistic licence with your own personality. A blog, or a good one anyway, is about imagining you are writing to that friend that you never see, that is never part of your life anymore except via letters. You can tell them anything because there is no chance ever that what you say can come back at you, nobody gets hurt, nobody worries and the vulnerability that you create for yourself is never exploited. The freedom of blogging is in the anonymity. Of course you also want people to be reading, or else what is the point. There is a certain amount of egocentricity (is that a word?) to it. You want people to follow you, and understand you and empathise and there is an idea of connecting with the masses and helping them through. Of course there is; we live in a world where we believe everything we have to say is golden and needs to be shared, that’s the reason forums like twitter and Facebook do so well.
Ironically, once you start to get readers the blogging becomes much more difficult – especially if they are people you know. Fergotron reads this blog. She is hugely supportive of it and that’s wonderful. I would imagine that anyone who starts a blog initially gets people close to them to follow and try to spread the word – how else can you start to build a following? The problem with this is that as one writes, one begins to employ a self-editor. The benefit of the blog is in knowing you can say anything, once you start to know people will see it you inevitably begin to review and question what you should and shouldn’t add in. You don’t want to upset anyone you know, you also don’t want to expose yourself to the people close to you. If I am trying to be strong and demonstrate that I am weak, how could my interactions ever be the same? As the following spreads amongst friends you find that you don’t want to let them know certain things. We all have an inner monologue that we don’t even share on twitter – imagine you found your friends reading your diary and talking about it, you wouldn’t feel the same when you spoke to them again. There is something unnerving about people knowing these things.
Ironically, once you start to get readers the blogging becomes much more difficult – especially if they are people you know. Fergotron reads this blog. She is hugely supportive of it and that’s wonderful. I would imagine that anyone who starts a blog initially gets people close to them to follow and try to spread the word – how else can you start to build a following? The problem with this is that as one writes, one begins to employ a self-editor. The benefit of the blog is in knowing you can say anything, once you start to know people will see it you inevitably begin to review and question what you should and shouldn’t add in. You don’t want to upset anyone you know, you also don’t want to expose yourself to the people close to you. If I am trying to be strong and demonstrate that I am weak, how could my interactions ever be the same? As the following spreads amongst friends you find that you don’t want to let them know certain things. We all have an inner monologue that we don’t even share on twitter – imagine you found your friends reading your diary and talking about it, you wouldn’t feel the same when you spoke to them again. There is something unnerving about people knowing these things.
Not that there are any dark secrets in this blog, but still it is more difficult to write now that I know Fergotron, Mittens, Team Johnstings, Mumsef and others within my close circle read it. Do I want them to know everything? Well no, of course not. Yes I want to be honest, and yes I want to be open but not at the expense of my own privacy. I don’t want to see my friends and have them ask how I am, but already know the answer, or want to talk about things that are not really for discussion, but written down to help me process and cope with day to day life – it is up to yourself how much you decide to share with different people, as Noel Gallagher said ‘We only see what people want us to see’. Naturally, with good friends things come up but that they would already know gives me a feeling of trepidation about writing more.
Perhaps though, the point of this blog is a little different to how I imagine. I tweet to parenting forums and so it may be that the direction of my writing and the content is less personal than I imagine and more geared towards the general experience of becoming a father and the transition of life therein. I feel now that I should stop mentioning when Fergotron and I fight – I’m sure she would be grateful for that anyway. As more people read I have to worry more and more about her privacy as well as my own. It’s not only myself that I expose in my writing.
Perhaps though, the point of this blog is a little different to how I imagine. I tweet to parenting forums and so it may be that the direction of my writing and the content is less personal than I imagine and more geared towards the general experience of becoming a father and the transition of life therein. I feel now that I should stop mentioning when Fergotron and I fight – I’m sure she would be grateful for that anyway. As more people read I have to worry more and more about her privacy as well as my own. It’s not only myself that I expose in my writing.
My weakness is my arrogance though, who do I even think is reading? Weebly have a handy statistics page so I can see how many times the website has been visited a day, and how many ‘unique’ people I get. The numbers aren’t bad, one day last week I got 50 different people and given that I don’t think I could name 50 friends that’s pretty impressive. But no-one comments, so I don’t know, maybe people don’t want to discuss it? I don’t know what, if anything, anyone gets out of this and I do hope if you have read this particular post then it doesn’t seem ungrateful? I am glad to have my 50 followers, I must be saying something that they want to hear and in a way I find the lack of comments a positive thing – whoever you are you are reading, digesting and interpreting this blog to help you with whatever you need. I think that’s the point of all writing, no two people should take exactly the same message from any piece as we all have different experiences and problems to apply it to.
However I do sometimes look at the comments section of my blog and wish someone would say something, just so that I know there’s someone there. So don’t be shy boys and girls, come and say hello, tell me how you are and if you would like to indulge my arrogance then ask me my opinion on something – I’d be happy to oblige
However I do sometimes look at the comments section of my blog and wish someone would say something, just so that I know there’s someone there. So don’t be shy boys and girls, come and say hello, tell me how you are and if you would like to indulge my arrogance then ask me my opinion on something – I’d be happy to oblige
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