Blogging For Self-Discovery

The first time I had ever heard of blogging, I happened across Wil Wheaton's blog... Being the huge Wil Wheaton fan that I am, I sat for hours upon hours reading everything. In fact, when he moved his blog due to some problems he was having with Moveable Type, I continued to follow his new blog, in Exile. Now, I'll be honest here, at first I thought he was crazy. But of course I live in a society that feeds off making stars miserable. To me, keeping this sort of a diary seemed akin to giving them ammo - to opening the front door to the masses.

And who wants that? I don't even open my front door to my neighbors. And yet, here he has been, blogging for years. Sharing pictures, stories, anecdotes... and most of all, doing it for himself - not necessarily for his fans.

At any rate - I became intrigued and decided to learn more about this growing phenomenon called a weblog, or blog. Finally, I came across this post that discussed the benefits of blogging. "Blogging for Self Discovery" ... Well, who would have thought...

Actually, obviously that guy thought of it. But I digress. One of the lines that really caught my attention out of his article was this:

Let’s go back in time a bit. When blogs first came on the scene, they were described as "online diaries." But blogs are much more than that. Traditionally, a diary is not something you share with others, but a blog is. People do not stop by your house and read your diary entries and then write their own opinions in your diary. But with blogs, that’s exactly what you do (makes comment spam seem even uglier, when you look at that way, doesn’t it?).

When I was a little girl, I tried multiple times to start and maintain a diary. Not because I necessarily wanted to record my deepest, darkest secrets, but because I viewed them as a portal. I had romanticized visions of sometime 50 years into the future, someone would find my diary and it would give a glimpse into my world.

Alas, everytime I tried to start a diary, I got about a week into it and stopped, all the while thinking to myself "what could I possibly have to write about that's so important. It's not like I'm Anne Frank" (One of my all-time favorite books, by the way). I didn't necessarily want to keep everything secret (except from my contemporaries) but I also didn't feel as if I had anything really important enough to say to warrant sharing either. But now, read the next line from that article:

I know it seems obvious that I’m saying a blog is like a diary, except it’s online and people can leave comments, but that’s exactly what changes everything: You are not alone.

That was the key, right there... You are not alone.

So, over the past two or three years now, I have been blogging at different places (though I do try my best to keep them all contained in one centralized location)... and I do this mostly to watch how I have grown in one form or another. Sure, tragedy will always spur on an instant need to reach out and share, and perhaps find support in the process from someone who can empathize with me. Occasionally I will find a news article that irks me to the point where I feel the need to rant about it publicly (okay, that one's more than just occasionally - there's a lot of stuff in the news that irks me).

And most everytime I write a blog entry somewhere, inevitably, someone else has been affected by that same news story or happening as what I'm ranting about. Those who agree with me lend support; those who disagree lend a new perspective. Either way, I win.

But mostly, I guess I'm just amazed at what I see when I look back and read over some of my old blog entries.

With a lot of the tools available for self discovery and growth, blogging is probably one of the most over-looked... yet it's also one of the tools that can be used the most efficiently for measuring your growth after the fact.