Why the hell are we still blogging?

My good friend Rachel Barenblat of The Velveteen Rabbi wrote recently, saying she was celebrating (like several of us) fifteen years of blogging, and wondering if we might like to do some sort of collaborative observance. She also invited Dave Bonta of Via Negativa, Lorianne DiSabato of Hoarded Ordinaries, Dale Favier of Mole, and Natalie d'Arbeloff of Blaugustine. We all met way back then, and have been good friends and readers and supporters of each other's work ever since -- so of course everybody said "yes." Here are some excerpts from the first installment, which was in answer to the question posed in the subject line of this post.  After you've had a look, I'd like to turn the question around and ask you: Why are you still reading blogs?

Buried Temple, by Natalie D'Arbeloff. Acrylic on paper, 37cm x 37 cm.

Why the hell are we still blogging?

Rachel: Writing is one of the fundamental ways I experience and explore the world, both the external world and my own internal world. I think it was EM Forster who wrote, “How do I know what I think until I see what I say?” Blogging as I’ve come to understand it is living one’s life in the open, with spiritual authenticity and intellectual curiosity, ideally in conversation or relationship with others who are doing the same.

Dave: At some level, it's easier to keep blogging at Via Negativa, the Morning Porch, and Moving Poems than it is to stop. Basically I'm an addict. Writing poetry is fun for me — entering that meditative head-space required for immersion in writing. As for the social aspect, I've been in, or on the periphery of, several distinct blogging communities over the years, and at one time, we all commented on each other's sites, but with the rise of social media, most blog commenting went away — and I'm not entirely sure that's a bad thing. Writing and responding to comments did take up a lot of my time ten years ago, and now that I can scratch that conversational itch on Twitter, or in real life with my partner, I'm OK with most interactions on my blogs being limited to pings. But I must immediately qualify that and admit that Via Negativa is a special case, because for well over half its existence now I've enjoyed the virtual companionship of a co-blogger, the brilliant and prolific poet Luisa Igloria, and a small number of occasional guest bloggers as well. I wouldn't say I'm competitive, but Luisa's commitment to a daily poetry practice has definitely forced me to up my game. Then there's Mr. Pepys. My Pepys Diary erasure project grew directly from sociability: my partner and I wanted to read the online version of the diary together, and I worried I might eventually get bored with it if I weren't mining it for blog fodder. 

Lorianne: I am not attached to the medium, but I am attached to the message, and the process of creating/sharing that message.  There has been a lot of hand-wringing among bloggers over the “death of the blog,” with long-time (and former) bloggers worried about attention divides between blogs and social media.  Where do “I” live if I post in multiple places: on blog, in a paper notebook, on social media? For those of us who do all three, the result can be confusing, distracting, and frazzling...or it can be creative, collaborative, and synergistic.

Dale: I didn’t really expect ever to have readers, so in a way, having readership dwindle is a return to the early days... I’ve outlived some of my personas -- I’m no longer recognizeably very Buddhist, and my politics have morphed in some odd ways. I don’t think I’m as salable an item as I used to be :-) But the inertia, as Dave said. When I do have something to say and my censor doesn’t step in, the blog is still where I go. It’s been home for fifteen years: my strand of the web… The community that was established way back when is still important to me, and still a large part of my life. And there’s still a lot of value in having a public space. The act of making something public changes it, changes how I look at. I become the viewers and the potential viewers. It helps me get out of myself. It helps me work through my favorite game of “what if I’m wrong about all these things?”

Natalie: Why the hell still blogging? Not sure I am still blogging. I put something up on Facebook whenever I feel like saying hey, listen, or hey, look at this. Then I copy/paste the post to Blogger where I keep Blaugustine going, mainly out of a sense of imaginary duty. The idea that there are some real people out there who may be actually interested in some of my thoughts and/or artwork is undoubtedly attractive, even necessary. I live a mostly hermit life and don’t get much feedback of any kind. But my interior life is very active, all the time, and having a tiny public platform online where I can put stuff is really helpful. To be perfectly honest I think that’s about it for me and blogging at present. I don’t do any other social media, it would all take too much time which I’d rather devote to artwork.

Beth: I think a lot of it has to do with a sense of place. My blog is like a garden or a living room that I’ve put energy and thought and care into as a place that’s a reflection of myself and is hopefully welcoming for others.. The discipline of gathering work and talking about it coherently has been extremely good for me and for my art practice. And I’ve also really appreciated and been inspired by other people who do the same, whatever their means of expression. There’s something deeply meaningful about following someone’s body of work, and their struggles, over not just months but years. In today’s climate of too-muchness and attention-seeking and short attention spans, I feel so encouraged and supported by the quiet, serious doggedness of other people like me!

So...why are you still reading blogs? Are you a writer or artist who's still blogging yourself?

Comments

[Jean]

Each of you still means so much to me. I think that says it all, really.

[Loren]

Strange you asked that, as I asked basically the same question yesterday in my blog since I hadn’t blogged in a couple of weeks and was having a hard time getting started again. With fewer and fewer visitors, at least according to the Wordpress stats, I have to wonder if it is still worth the effort.

I’m having a heck of time following long-time bloggers who are now all over the place, on Facebook (which I visit regularly), on Twitter (where I get notified but seldom actually visit), to Google+ which seems to be in the act of disappearing, not to mention my RSS reader which overwhelms me quite regularly and I just mark everything as read and start over.

Amazingly, I did hear from some people that I’ve never heard from before that were inspired by my nature shots and urged me to keep posting. They and habit, probably mostly habit, after so many years, keep me posting irregularly.

[Dick Jones]

Beyond simply declaring that I can't stop, I can't account for why, 15 years on, I'm still at it. I'm so very glad that I am & that you my friends still are too!

[am]

Reading blogs expanded my sense of community, beginning with a blogging community of writers and artists. One of the first blogs I read was Rachel's. After reading and commenting anonymously on a few blogs for a year, I started my own blog in December 2006 in order to post a retrospective of my art work. My blog is my only form of social media. I have a small circle of new and long-term blog friends in the U.S. and Canada and the U.K. and a long-term blog friend who lives in the Rhine Valley in Germany. I keep reading blogs because I treasure the feeling of a sense of community beyond my immediate community in a small town in the Pacific Northwest.

Thank you for asking!

[Thomas Kempton]

I do not blog any longer. Why not? I suppose it is because I wanted to communicate something 'spiritual', something I felt - perhaps foolishly - was important. In the end I began to feel disillusioned. But I still read other people's blog posts, well some of them anyway. I don't often have anything worth saying in response, but I feel I am still in some sort of contact at some level.

[Roderick Robinson]

Since launching my blog in 2008 I resumed writing novels (albeit with rather more planning), started on short stories, and began to flirt with verse - three ways of writing with three different demands. Blogging, limited to 300-word posts - an aftermath to 44 years spent in journalism, formed an experimental background to these more disciplined endeavours. And, let's face it, more often an indulgence.

Blogging differed in that it provided an immediate dialogue, something of a luxury when grinding out (and re-grinding) the 100,000 words that constitute an average-length novel. Commenters arrived and departed and I profited from their observations. Some asked for guidance and that was flattering if inevitably delusional.

That dialogue has diminished but I continue to blog in honour of those exhilarating five or six years, for I am not a social animal. As with Dave Bonta, I doubt I could stop now. Ideas, opinions and conceits arrive at the same rate and it would be a shame to waste them. Especially since the special type of energy needed to sustain a novel - still my preferred form of expression - appears to be waning.

In brief, it's a habit.

[Robb]

Kia Ora Beth,
Interesting timing of this post as I have recently gone off Facebook, and value the chunks of little time that have added up to heaps of time saved from scrolling through I'm not sure what looking for something even more elusive. I love visiting some of the blogs mentioned here and a few others. A far cry from the days of past, however, when the blogosphere was humming. Some of those writers have become real time friends. I love the slowness and thoughtfulness reading a blog post can bring. To set down a cup of tea and ponder a thought it has provoked, or re-read to understand better. To have the time to relish. Like being with an old friend. Kia Kaha to all.
Arohanui e hoa,
Robb