How to blog (I wish I knew, part two)

This is part two of the series in which I admit this blogging thing is a real crapshoot educational experience.  In part one I had just identified two distinct types of fear:  (1) the paralyzing kind; and (2) fear that frightens you terribly, but also feels like a risk worth taking.

When I write something and find myself hesitating to reveal my innermost feelings, I sometimes stop and wonder… what would my former colleagues or old boyfriends think of me if they read this?  I do not recommend, under any circumstances, asking (or answering!) that question of yourself.  

But I’m learning to be grateful when it pops up for me.   This question’s presence is a signal that I’m somehow, inadvertently, expressing myself in a way that feels icky by way of disingenuous.  And “inadvertently” here obviously means “accidentally-on-purpose.”

Here’s what I notice when I write something that doesn’t ring true for me, that somehow feels off: I feel remorse and regret for the connection that could have been.  If only I had been myself.  If only I had said what I really thought, and explained how I truly felt.  And the fear that I’m not being myself is the fear that feels dirty and paralyzing.

When I manage to polish my thoughts and beliefs until the words shimmer in my heart, the fear is still there.  Because when I speak honestly from my soul, some people won’t relate to what I say and those people might walk away.  That’s painful and it’s scary.  But now it’s the fear that feels worth facing.  It’s the choice to be recognized as myself over being loved for some role I’m playing.

Also, there are a couple of different dynamics at play when it comes to wanting people to read my diary.  There are the people I want to reach that I don’t know yet.  People that I hope to find by the very act of writing and revealing.  And then there is the possibility of deepening the level of intimacy with the people who already loom large in my life.  

I wonder how many people receive comments on their blogs from friends and family that say something along the lines of “wow, I never knew this about you, and thank you for sharing.”  Again, isn’t this the connection we’re reaching for all of the time?  Maybe sometimes the writer is sharing something about herself she didn’t even know until she tried to express it honestly on the page.    

One of my dearest friends just read something I wrote and said that of course she always knew these things.  But gosh, now she felt like she really, truly, got this part of me.  The beautiful, wildly ironic thing about her comment is that I try very hard to write in the same voice I use when I’m just hanging out with her.  Because she’s someone I never adulterate myself around, someone who brings out the best in me.  

And yet…  She still didn’t really know.  And I guess that’s why I want her, and you, to read my diary.

One of my absolute favorite things about reading is that luminous moment when I come across something someone else has written, and it resonates so deeply within me that I realize the words were written on my heart long before I read them.  

The beauty of writing is that now I get to be that person.  I get to discover the gem already nestled under all of those layers.  What if I even get to awaken it in someone else?  

All of that feels very warm and loverly.  Okay.  But being myself out loud, online is still really scary.  Make no mistake, letting people, asking them to read about what I think and how I feel makes me vulnerable and self-conscious in a major way.  

I think I’d describe it as wearing my insides on the outside.  Like wearing my heart as a dress.  A short one that reveals a little more leg than I am altogether comfortable with.

But I guess these days, that’s just my style.  Because, like Anais Nin said:

…the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

And all that.