Lost & Found: Blogging and Self-Discovery
If overly contrived titles were One-dollar bills, I might have just hit the jackpot. In the last few months, I found something that I was not searching for because I was unaware it was lost - me.
After ten years spent as an educator and human service provider, an unexpected change in circumstances helped me re-discover my passion and (in my opinion) talent for writing. A struggling economy mixed with a public school district on life support left me unemployed and at a personal and professional crossroads.
Instead of marching down to the job center, I logged into my mostly-neglected blog. The next few weeks became a study in self-discovery. I started to write everyday. What had been a hobby was now a daily exercise of turning scattered thoughts into words and phrases that had meaning. Just as push-ups build the arms and chest, I was bulking up for the contest of my life.
In today's social media saturated world, it seems like everyone has a blog. Increasingly, blogs have become accepted and respected sources of information. Ask yourself where you get most of your news about entertainment, politics, or sports and I bet that at least one of your sources is a blog site. Gone are the days when a selected few individuals or networks had the sole decision over what was considered "news." Blogging has allowed everyone to be part of the process.
Without blogging, the world would have never heard of a Matthew Drudge, Necole Bitchie, or Perez Hilton. In fact, the space where this article appears would be non-existent if not for common people wanting to share their uncommon talents in the written word.
The other day, someone I follow on Twitter typed that she hoped others appreciated how much fun she was having making "categories" and "tags" for her blog. I responded that she had captured the essence of blogging. It is the unchaperoned, unsanctioned experience of getting your thoughts out in a public domain. Blogging is the skinny dipping of the social media experience. The task alone is a reward; but, if someone else reads your writing - and maybe even likes it - the experience is made that much sweeter.
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