I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about why it is that I blog. And I think that it’s mostly because I like to write, and I enjoy getting the feedback whenever it comes. But I’ve been going through my blog archives and I’m truly horrified at some of my posts! And comparing posts from years past with my current writing seems to indicate to me anyway that I’ve really not progressed much, and I’m beginning to wonder if my blogging is hindering my progress. I want my blog to be a place of positivity, to share things with people and to get feedback from the things that I share. I want my blog to kinda be a two-way conversation, where I say something to the affect of “hey did you see this, what did you think”, or “hey I had a really crappy day today”, and then get feedback.
I just don’t feel like my blog is a place where people want to be, and that bothers me. If my blog were a house, I’d envision it as a place of doom and gloom, where everyone is angry, upset, grouchy and generally not fun to be around. And yeah, I occasionally want to vent, but I don’t want this blog to be one big rant box. As I’ve mentioned before, I’d like to blog about the beautiful day we’re having here, or the adventure Chloe and I had, or something like that.
But the truth is, much of the time, I’m not at that place right now, at least not in my head. I don’t think I’m depressed or angry or anything, it’s just that I’m still pondering and reflecting over things in my mind, things that I’ve already blogged about many times already, and I just feel like I keep going over and over the same things over and over again, and much of those things are things that leave me feeling irritated, are things I don’t have closure to, and/or are things I’ve just not resolved in my head. And generally, when I’m like this, I tend to want to talk or write or blog about the same things over and over again, it’s just my way of dealing with something until I can sufficiently resolve it enough in my own mind to stop thinking / pondering over it and just put it to rest.
I’m not thinking of taking my blog down entirely or making it completely private, but I am considering making the bulk of my posts private until I can get out of this funk I’m in. I’ve tried the “taking my blog down”/”making my blog private” stuff before, and perhaps I like whatever small limelight or attention I do get too much, because that never seems to last too long and then my blog is back up. And that need for attention/recognition bothers me too. But I truly feel that perhaps instead of my blog drawing people here it’s pushing people away. And that bothers me.
I’m worried that I’m blogging for the attention, I’m blogging to be noticed, and I’ve often thought that I’m not sure that I want my issues and idiosyncrosies in plain view for the whole world to see/comment on. And every time I blog about something that upsets me, angers me, or even makes me happy, that’s what I may, even if inadvertently, be doing.
I post the below comment, regarding my latest reaction to Umar Lee’s recent blog post as an illustration and an example.
I think you let something personal get in the way of what you posted;
I didn’t even get through the first sentence, before I just stopped reading the comment altogether, because I didn’t want to hear/read the comment because I perceived it at the time as being negative/in disagreement with what I’d written. I wanted to tell them they’re wrong, that I don’t have anything personal against Umar Lee, except for the fact that I don’t agree with the methodology of Islam he follows, etc. However I knew I shouldn’t have even blogged about this in the first place. I knew it when I wrote the post, yet and still, I wrote it anyway. And let’s not even talk of continuing to read his blog, that’s another issue, although a related one, entirely.
I don’t know the history between you and Umar Lee or even if there is a history, although I get the impression there is.
I want to say that there’s not though my archived blog posts might suggest otherwise. If anyone, including this commentor, cared to look. Though as I said, it’s nothing “personal” for me anyway, though it might seem as much to an outside observer, and as they say perception is reality in many cases, and I just don’t have the energy to try and explain once again, where I’m coming from at this point. Because I thought I’d already explained it before.
Lee addressed a point many Muslims are talking about in the wake of what happened at Ft.Hood; I don’t think he was doing that to get at or make points against other Muslims who happen to disagree with him.
I really wish I’d not have ignored this comment when I first saw it, that I’d not have figuratively covered my ears and said “la la la la la”, because I really beg to disagree with this statement, because many of Umar’s posts have been directly at scholars/organizations that he has philosophical and other issues with. And the issue of Muslims in the military was just another opportunity for him to beat the same drum he’s always been beating. However, not only that, I shouldn’t have even blogged about this in the first place. Or at least, I should have made it a private post, if I felt so compelled to write about it, because instead of highlighting Umar’s issues, it highlighted my own, to which the commentor referred to above.
Muslims have served in the US military honorably almost 100% of the time about that there is no question, so if your point is they can you are correct and I agree wholeheartedly, but today’s US military has become an instrument of occupation and oppression of indigenous populations and not a protector of defender of the US, US interests, US citizens or the US constitution. No one should serve in the military under those circumstances, Muslim, Christian, other.
This comment really wasn’t as bad as the first sentence led me to believe. The fact that I didn’t finish reading it, as I’m thinking about it, speaks volumes about myself. Because I don’t think I blog so much because I want feedback or any kind of constructive criticism, but I blog because I want to write, to get things off my chest, and I blog publicly, because, truthfully speaking, I’d like to see how many people agree with me. Or are thinking the same things I’m thinking. I don’t like criticism too much, I tend to take it waaay too personally. And I think I know why, because when I’m criticized, I’m back at the blind school as a child, being criticized by that one houseparent, and not only being made to feel that that one quality of me may need work, but that none of me is good, that the whole of me is bad.
The thing is, that while what I’m blogging about today might seem cool and good and enlightened and all of that, I may read it a year or two from now and be truly horrified, like I was today in re-reading some of my past posts. And the fact is, I’m not sure what I’m going to do. I’m not sure if WordPress has a default blog setting, where individual posts can be set to a default privacy/security level as can be done on Livejournal. Because that’s what I’d like to do, until I can evaluate said posts and decide if they can be made public or if I should keep them private. Perhaps the best I can do at this point is just save the posts as drafts. Though I like putting them as private because then I can view them as blog posts within my blog, and I don’t have to go into the Drafts folder to find them.
The thing is, as much as I like the recognition my blog has gotten lately via other blogs and via BrassCrescent, I am slowly once again, coming to the realization that I’m not sure that blogging is contributing positively to either my own spiritual development, or the image of myself that I’d like to project online. But at this point, I’m thinking of my own spiritual development, and what Allah would want me to do, more than what kind of “image” I’m projecting to others. The fact that I’ll have to answer for everything I’ve written publicly on here I’m finding truly mortifying and frightening.
And while I know I have the right to do what I want with this blog, I don’t want to seem like I’m waffling or throwing another temper tantrum, having a private blog one minute and a public one the next. I want to make a clear and well-thought-out decision and do my best to stick to it. And the best course of action at this point is to keep my posts private, for the most part, but keeping the blog public, and only making posts public when some time has passed after writing the post, such that I can decide, after some reflection, whether or not it’s something that should even be put out for public consumption.