Reluctance to Blog
November 27, 2023
I am advised that these days, writers must blog.
I don’t want to.
Retrospection: “The act or process or an instance of surveying the past.” It’s a uniquely useful human quality and one of my favorites. Place it alongside Reconsideration: “To consider again, especially with a view to changing or reversing.”* These are well-muscled personal attributes that I have come to regard as strengths and provide justification for my reluctance to blog. Unlike current fashion, which favors “going with your gut” and “trusting your instincts,” I prefer holding back, keeping mum, and cautiously considering all worthwhile inputs.
I consider myself rather lousy at thinking on my feet. A major stumbling block to my advancement within academia was my self-evaluation that my lectures were too (totally) reliant upon a well-crafted outline. There wasn’t allowance for deviations or questions. If it wasn’t in that outline, I didn’t know it. The appearance of weak thinking is dangerous for a TA to display before undergraduate students. The same holds true for cocktail parties, or writers conventions. I learned to be comfortable keeping my current thoughts inside.
Why, then, would I blog?
I prefer time to ponder and consider, and even with that luxury, I still balk at revealing most of my opinions. Within personal relationships, I find it best to keep mute whenever possible. Some might say I am withholding and non-transparent. That is probably accurate, but it favors a practice honed through retrospection. On too many occasions, when I had let my first emotional responses rule, regret often ensued. I don’t say my “gut” is reliably incorrect, but if it is allowed to rule, selfishness, self-centeredness, and an authoritarian desire for simplicity and dominance leap into the fast lane, and stomping on the brakes at 110mph is hazardous and quite inefficient.
I’ve learned that humanity is best served when I practice retrospection instead of offering immediate feedback.
In conversation, a dear friend once told me, “Knowledge is useless unless it is shared.” I believe that. Withholding as a personality trait is one thing; withholding useful information is cognitive hoarding. Others, wiser than I, overcame their reticence, and I benefit from their boldness.
So, in a mash-up of intentions, I intend to bring you this: Quotes.
I’ve seen instances where people whom I admire detest quotes. I respectfully disagree. The quotes I find meaningful and insightful provide both illumination and guardrail to the path of my life. I benefit from the well-stated greater wisdom of others. In my blog, I will share the quotes I live by or find inspiring or amusing and briefly examine each one. I offer them as gifts that have been run through my personal retrospection filter.
Maybe that will be a useful way to reach out.
But it won’t be daily. That’s exhausting. Feel free to comment.
Hmm. I must like hyphens
* Definitions from Dictionary.com
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