To blog or not to blog?

A few years ago, when the idea of blogging started becoming a big thing, when everyone and their dog sent you an e-mail telling you that they wanted to "share their ideas with the world", I must admit that I didn't get the idea of blogging at all. "You mean people just write about whatever they want? And then they put it up on the internet for everyone to see? And people actually read these mindless babblings?" I must admit, I was a nay-sayer and an unbeliever of the realm of blog.

And to tell you the truth, deep down I still am. I mean, what the heck does the word "blog" mean anyway? I think that most of the blog posts out there are not worth the 30 seconds it would take to skim over them. Why would I want to know the opinion of some faceless entity on subjects ranging from politics to religion to pop culture? Why would I want to delve into the psyche of other random people when I am barely aware of my own feeling and thought processes most of the time?

And that's where I have my epiphany, and the whole reasoning behind the world of computer bloggers suddenly comes into focus for the very first time. Blogs aren't created because the blogger really thinks that his/her opinions are going to go out there and change the world. They don't write for other people. They write for themselves. There's something about writing that helps you organize your thoughts and look at your life in a new light. Humans are set apart from the rest animal kingdom by the fact that they are self-aware. They are able to analyze not only what they think and feel, but analyze why they think and feel that way. When you write, you can take the endless train of thought that normally zooms through your head, rarely making a stop for any maintenance, and plop them down into something concrete. Suddenly your thoughts become words you can read on a page. They are physical, visible things, and they often look different then they did when when they were an endless stream of commentary running in your mind.

That brings me to my next question: if any writing is useful for examining your life, why not write a book, or essays, or articles, or short stories, or anything that is a little more "literary" than a blog? The answer: Motivation. The idea of doing all the research and preparation, and then doing all the writing and revising necessary to actually write something like that makes me tired and drives the desire to write right out of me. A blog is a quick easy way to spew out your ideas in a quick and dirty way. Are most blogs innovative, new, fresh, literary, refined or important? No. Is it worth your time to actually read most blogs? Probably not. Does blogging actually help the blogger analyze his/her life and become more self-aware? Hopefully.

So, here we go. I am fully aware that I will most likely post hardly anything on this blog. I fully expect that no one will ever read it. Nothing I say will be important or will "change the world". But, hopefully I actually take time to write something every once in a while, and in so doing can take a little time to take stock on how my life's doing. Happy blogging!