On Blogging

So, I have a question for you today... what brings you here? I don't mean here, this blog, I mean to blogging at all. I've been reading different posts lately about how much we share and let our readers into our lives, or don't. And staying or topic, or not. About feelings of inadequacy and not measuring up. And who are we blogging for.
And I've thought about it. We all have to decide what we're comfortable sharing and that's different for everyone. The thing about feeling inadequacy, I think, is when we white wash our lives all of the time when we sit down to blog. A lot of bloggers don't feel comfortable sharing the harder moments of their lives or prefer to always keep it on the positive side and I can't fault them for that. It is difficult to share our vulnerability and our struggles and you can't help but wonder if you're just coming across as whiny and complaining and a general 'negative Nancy'. But here is how I look at blogging....

When I sit down to blog, I think of it as sitting down with a good friend over a cup of coffee. We share our daily lives, anecdotes about our children and family, what we've been up to, updates on particular situations. We share advice and tips and we talk about our struggles, our heartaches, our longings. We share the beauty in our lives, the things that make our heart sing and inspire us.
You, my reader, are like a good friend. No, I don't know you. Though, I am getting to know a handful of you. But this blog is me opening up the back door and inviting you in for a cup and a chat.
I've had 'relationships' with people in the past who held back, not a little but pretty much everything. And these people didn't share anything that was real in themselves, just what I could already see on the outside. Those 'relationships' never last long and for me, I always left them feeling unsatisfied, it was all very surface, you know?
Personally, I feel that I would be inauthentic if I just blogged right through every trouble and when my heart is breaking. Blogging right along with pretty house pictures and crafting goodness and my children being marvelously well behaved and playing together peacefully... when in all honestly, I'm falling apart. It doesn't mean I can't share the goodness in times like these, it's therapeutic, I think, to focus on beauty and positive things. But I think I would be untrue, to my reader and myself, if I didn't stop in just to say, 'It's really hard for me right now, or just moments ago the children were on the verge of sending me into a nervous break down, or whatever!' (This isn't going on right now, just so you know.) And I believe it helps my readers connect with me, and perhaps say 'Yes!, this is exactly where I am and it's nice to know I am not alone and life does still go on, beautifully, in fact.'
Sure, there's lots that you don't know about me. That I don't share because it's too intimate or because I fear judgment. But right here, I am trying to be authentic, for both of us. People blog for a lot of reasons, and this kind of sharing isn't always applicable or appropriate. But I am blogging to reach out to like minded mamas and families, to make a connection and to share and be inspired by all the loveliness that is in my little corner of the blogging world. I have met some really beautiful women here and the connection was made out of empathy. We connect, we relate to one another and when we visit one another's blog it's like keeping up with each other lives, not like being shown a lovely yet unattainable vision that, while pleasant to view, doesn't connect with me.

I guess that's all I'm saying.. I blog to connect and share. Why do you blog?

Oh, and if I am ever thought to be 'white washing', perhaps I should put a tab on top, linking to all the nitty gritty. Because, believe me, any new readers, it's there!