I’ve been “kinda-sorta” blogging since the days of LiveJournal, which I can’t believe is still around, by the way, so for about 19 years. Back in the days of LJ though, I was just writing diary entries and reading funny posts on my friends page, so it was a personal thing and not something I considered to be a blog. I mainly wrote to stay in touch with my friends or to vent about things going on in my life at the time.
I don’t remember when I stopped going to LiveJournal, but it was probably sometime around 2012 because I know that I met a friend I still have to this day through a role-playing community on LJ, and we met after the first Avengers movie was released. So, yeah, definitely sometime after 2012. I haven’t had a regular on-line journal or blog since then, but I’ve started quite a few blogs that have failed.
Oh, yes, I don’t even know how many blogs I’ve started that haven’t lasted more than a few posts before I lose interest in them at all. And the really bad thing is that I love the thought of blogging. I really want to have a regular blog and have tried to have one for years, but I consistently post a few articles and then stop.
So one of the reasons why I started blogging again here on my web-site is because I really, really want to have a blog. I love writing just as much as I love drawing, and I love the thought of having a place to share my thoughts, my writing, my art, and my experiences. Which is why I keep coming back to the idea and why I’m trying it yet again with this site.
What’s been holding me back? What has made me give up on each blog before this? Why do I think I can consistently update this blog when I failed so many times before?
I can definitely answer what has made me give up on so many blogs before this one. And it comes down to one word.
FEAR.
Every time I sit down to write one of these posts, I am terrified. And this is something I have struggled with since the times of just posting for my friends to see it on LiveJournal, but it gets worse when I’m trying to blog about something specific. I think of a topic I want to talk about, begin to write, get about halfway done, and I suddenly get gripped with fear. Fear that no one will read this. Fear that no one cares about what I’m writing about. And, worst of all, fear that I have nothing interesting to say about anything at all.
There’s a little part of me that believes I am extremely boring and that no one will want to read about what I have to say. There are so many people more knowledgable, more experienced, and more successful than I am in every topic that I want to write about, so why in the world should I write about anything? Even now I’m starting to think that I shouldn’t blog about my anxiety over blogging because why would anyone want to read about me struggling to blog?
It’s a vicious cycle, it really is! Sometimes living with my anxiety can be exhausting.
So part of why I’m really trying to stick with blogging this time is to get over this fear. Or- if I can’t get over it- so that I can learn to deal with it and do this even though I’m afraid. I’ve had a lot of fear to overcome in life. Doing art and working with horses has taught me a lot, including how to work through fear and come out on the other side as a better, stronger, more confident person. I hope that through this blog I can work through another fear, and also that I can share some of my favorite things with those of you who take the time to come here and read the silly things that I write.
What fears have you had to work through in your own life? Let me know!
