On Oversharing And The Future Of The Blog
As you might already know, it’s been over a year since I started sharing too much of my life with you on this platform. If you think you’ve seen too much on here, then, oh just thank God you don’t have to read any of my diary entries.
As I continue this journey I began naively in the embers of 2018, I have often wondered if there’s really such a thing as ‘too much’. Is there a point in which what I decide to share classifies as excessive, too real or inappropriate? I guess, although I have definitely written about thoughts, feelings and experiences that have left my soul naked to whoever lays eyes on the pages, I don’t think I have found myself scared to hit publish because a piece could be potentially controversial – yet. Rather, I have stared at something I have written for hours on end because of a personal fear of letting a part of myself go into the deep wide web forever.
Although I started with little to no experience in the baby stages of this blog, I always sort of had a clear vision of what I wanted to build and the kind of community I hoped my pages would attract. Yes, the vision has shifted and has been altered by my many experiences and what I genuinely love to read, however, I feel like at its core it has always remained the same.
I wanted to be heard, I guess. I wanted to be seen, truly seen… and I knew the first way I could do that was to write things down because as long as I can remember writing had always been the way I expressed, and maybe on some level, understood myself. I also wanted to see if people could relate to me – the pain, the joy and all. I wanted to test out whether my feelings were alien, and I was glad to find out that more often than not they weren’t.
Anyways, today, I just thought I would reevaluate what I want this blog to be throughout the year and beyond (unless I change my mind of course!). What do I want to say as a whole? Am I bringing the vision I had back then to life? Am I still inspired?
I’ll answer that last one first because I’m genuinely fascinated by the idea of inspiration in general. How much of it is pure inspiration and how much of it boils down to pure hard work? I mean, I’m sure the best combination is probably a bit of both; lightbulb moment meets hours punching away on the keyboard type scenario. The truth is most times, this perfect scenario just doesn’t happen to me, especially nowadays. Life has been taking me up and down on its always tumultuous roller-coaster and because of that, sometimes, I find myself in front of my screen with no inspiration and no desire to channel my highs and lows into a thousand-word piece, vivid colourful images and a catchy heading.
That’s where hard work comes into play and I have to punch away until I spit the words out, and to be completely transparent, I’m doing exactly that right now.
In terms of the direction of the posts I write, I think I’ve done a pretty good job of writing about the things I care about at the moments of their crafting. In fact, I would go as far as to say that I’m sure I write ten times better when I’m in deep with whatever the subject is.
I’ve written about things I was living through at the moment, from the lack of direction that came with adulting to the pain of losing friends, and almost always there was a pending sigh of relief I’d let out once the post was in your hands. There are, however, deeper issues I’ve always wanted to write about I finally feel I can jump into with the foundation I created here.
Firstly, although I do sometimes open up about my disability, I do feel like it’s something I want to be even more open about and expand on. There are many ways and angles in which I can write about disability and I’m sure I haven’t explored nearly half of it yet. All I know is if growing up I read a blog about disability in all its different facets, maybe my relationship with talking about it would be different and perhaps, a little more comfortable.
Another thing I would so love to give my two cents on is the topic of immigration. On Instagram I read someone state that the experience of immigrant children often gets overlooked, and I couldn’t agree more. It’s a complicated relationship the one I have with culture, country, beliefs and family. I certainly would love to get in on that conversation online.
Also, I hope to post on a more regular basis if that inspiration and hard work thing end up working out well. I am thinking twice a week when possible (let me know in the comments which days you’d prefer), but I should probably let you know I haven’t been able to keep up with it before so maybe making a public resolution will force my hand a little (hopefully a lot).
On another note though, I have been struggling with an irritating shoulder pain in the last few months, so I hope the doesn’t affect the roll-out of the future posts.
Lastly, you might care to know that my previous post ‘8 Lifestyle Blogs You Should Be Reading In Your 20s’ was one to celebrate as it hit the 50th post benchmark! It’s crazy to think it’s already been 50 and at the same time, a part of me knows it could be more.
There you have it! I hope you continue to follow my journey in the blogosphere, and maybe this year we can take things to another level. Here’s to the future, and every damn thing it brings!
Your restless romantic roamer
