Webbready

Discretion is the most difficult part of blogging by far.

Although it can be difficult to find the words to express the precise representation of one’s thoughts, assuming that a person is not suffering from an impairment that limits one’s ability to type and communicate through the written word, it is easy to write. I could elaborate on the very comfortable red Christmas socks that I wore today, rather than provide this information in a single sentence. Yet, I do not, as I do not know who will stumble across this journal. I write the previous words not out of fear or hope but out of caution. If I were truly afraid, I would have never started a blog in the first place. At the same time, though, there is a judgement each person who communicates has to make about what information he or she chooses share with the world.

What makes the process even more difficult is the fact that as humans, our memories can be very unreliable, and combined with the inadequacy of words at times, the events that are reported are not the same as what have happened. Since blogging is predominately non-fiction, there is a presumption that what one is writing about is “the truth” or opinions on what the blogger believes is “the truth.” Even when one disagrees with another person who writes an entry in an on-line journal, most people accept that the person who writes the words truly believes what they write.

However, it is as impossible to capture the whole and accurate truth through words as it is to capture a moment in time. Every individual person has far more thoughts than he or she can express. Through the selection process inherent in communication, people choose which thoughts are those to be shared and which thoughts are meant to be saved for the self. Of course, language is not a passive medium of communication; it in of itself shapes thoughts which in turn shape the language itself. Despite all this, there are many things to communicate, some more important than others. Assuming all are equally unimportant, what do you write to the world, to your friends, and to yourself? What do you keep for yourself and release to the world? These are questions I struggle to answer, which is primarily why this blog is close to bare as of this writing.