Why do we blog? Pt. 2

Listening to: 'DVNO' by Justice [†]

[Pt. 1's here, BTW]

Healio commented on my last post about blogging, and while I doubt he's psychic in any way ;-), he managed to touch on something that's been running through my mind a lot lately. He suggested three methods of solving a problem, which I shall list for you now -

1. confront it
2. ignore it
3. talk to a friend about it

Now personally, I disagree with the second method...in my opinion, sweeping things under the carpet only makes things worse. But I accept that this is common path for many. I think blogging is actually a subset of option three. You're getting things out of your system and if you're lucky, someone will read it and comment. The advantage is that (hopefully) the person commenting is removed from the situation, so emotions aren't involved. Of course the success of this method depends on the blogger depicting the situation accurately without embellishments and bias, but the same applies when talking to a friend, so no biggie.

So...why bother? Why bother with all this secretive stuff when you could just vent to a friend (or a tree, apparently)? Well yeah, lot of sense in that, but it doesn't necessarily work for me. Why? Well this brings me to the other part of haelio's comment -

"If no one can understand what your problem is then they can't help you."

Now this would be an issue if I were asking for help, but I'm not. I don't want you to help, I just want you to listen (or rather, the only way you can help is if you just listen). And this is where talking to friends rarely does me any good...'cos most try to help.

Now I know this makes me seem like a really ungrateful person but hear me out, please. There are times when I do need help, and I'll gladly accept it. Here's an example. A few months back, I lamented the lack of a hobby, and a friend lent me his guitar. See, that was me asking for help and accepting it when it was given, and being very grateful for it. But then there are other times, when I'm in a bad mood (call it hormones, call it depression, call it whatever you want), and I just need a hug. What do I get instead? "you need to stop thinking like this" / "you're just feeling sorry for yourself" / "you're fussing for nothing"...hardly the reception I was hoping for, wouldn't you say? There are a few friends who do listen, but they're literally many many miles away, which makes communicating rather difficult at times. So this blog has become my friend. The one who listens and doesn't pass judgement. The one who listens and doesn't treat it as a problem that needs solving, but more a state of mind that needs to pass. The one who listens and doesn't make me feel like I'm a burden.

So this is why I blog. My pseudonym exists purely as a means of escapism, and hence I haven't been unduly concerned about it, until now. I understand and accept that Darwin's reasons for maintaining anonymity are different in this case (and yes I do remember the incident! :D ) but at the end of the day, the anonymity exists so that we can all avoid awkward confrontations.

As for my blogworthy unbloggables, well they're still blogworthy, and they're still unbloggable...but I managed to catch SoulSister today and boy did I let my guts rip (while she probably did her best to stay awake, poor thing)!