Why did I start blogging?
I think it is because I am a story teller and I love telling stories.. I do it best when I am with friends and family, I mean in person.. but it is not always possible to be with people in person and trade stories... that is when blog comes in handy...
Where do I get the stories from? Well, from life around me, the people that I meet and connect with, the places I visit and make my home... till about three years ago, I used to write long emails to a select bunch of friends, the ones who were my dedicated readers.. who were visiting diverse places in different corners of India and abroad through my words and descriptions... it was a joy for me to write to them and also convenience... because if I narrate the story to one person, I know that my enthusiasm to narrate the same story to someone else goes down drastically... this way I could reach to large number of friends without having to worry about loosing interest in the story or loosing the story in itself.... the trick is, to capture the story at the very moment it starts taking roots in my mind... and sometimes it happens at odd moments, just as I am falling asleep or while commuting to work.. when it is almost impossible to grasp a piece of paper and write it down... I have lost so many stories this way, simply because they caught me at wrong moment.. and then it feels kind of empty and barren....
I had to find solution to this problem and that came through a blog. I started scribbling key words in a tiny notebook all day long and at the end of the day turn it into a blog post. This way I could reach many friends at the same time, provided they checked the blog but I could also reach out to many strangers... from across the world... people I have never met before and will probably never meet.. people I have nothing in common with and people who share tremendous similarity with my life... and most important it costs me nothing... and it costs people nothing... apart from their time...
This blog gave me a means to express myself in the most difficult phase of my life. When I lost the person who I used to tell all my stories, this blog opened a world of readers who were reading my story and sometimes even commenting on it.. this blog also became a means for my friends to check on me in those days... as long as I was writing, they could relax.. but the moment I got silent, they knew they had to check on me... this was our nonverbal communication of sorts... As I started feeling better and recovered my sense of being, my urge to write became less strong... I was still experiencing amazing things, learning and growing, but I just did not know what to write about.. I guess, in recent times, I started emailing a few friends more often and blog became less and less of my focus.... but in last one month, three friends started questioning me seriously about my silence. They wanted to know why I had stopped writing. They urged me to write again and I had to give it a serious thought...
I think, I would like to revive this blog for the simple reason that I love to write, I love to express myself through words, and I love to stay connected with my friends. Through this blog, in a way I document my life and my state of mind, the plethora of emotions and myriad of experiences that I gather.. Its like writing a personal journal but in a public space of virtual world... One can discover so many nuances about the self just by reading through old journals ... its kind of looking into a mirror, witnessing process of growth and transformation and in that sense, the blog is of immense value... Even though there is difference in the intricate details of personal journal and the blog, the opportunity it provides for self reflection is incredible.. and that is what I like the most about it... I am also an avid reader of blogs and there are so many bloggers and the blog posts that make me smile, give me a sense of belonging to this global community... a connection through words to so many souls... it is so often that I feel as if I have found another me in the writings of some other bloggers... We all are so similar and so different at the same time... but overarching thread is the same.. 'I am another you'.....
Another advantage of writing a blog at a regular basis is to make it part of my life, to be it.. to make it a habit.. I do not want it to be a medium of expression only when I am terribly happy or incredibly low... these are the drastic peaks and valleys.. but I want it to be my regular companion... just as each day comes and goes... it need not be spectacular or extraordinary.. rather this blog should be an attempt to find joy and reasons to express in most mundane things of life, finding extraordinary in the ordinary... I want some form of consistency, regularity and rhythm to it.. I am curious to know how my everyday life looked lets say few years from now.. so this is my efforts to document the moments that otherwise can be lost very easily...
Last reason I want to blog is to share my experiences with others. Due to my work and my life being on constant move, I am always moving around the world. That gives me opportunity to meet interesting people and visit exciting places.. Madhavi, my friend always makes me realize what a privileged life I live in terms of life experiences. She often says how much she yearns to be part of my life but simply cant.. and that is why I should document bits and pieces of my life so that she can be part of it.... I owe a big time to this wonderful girl friend of mine and I will write for her if for nothing else.. because I know what it means for her....
So this blog is more of a personal project. It definitely has lot of advantages for myself... and probably none for the readers apart from some interesting reads, some moments of laughter or just to feel a strange connection with a stranger... but should that be a reason for me not to write? I dont think so... I am going to blog because I love blogging and I will continue to blog as long as I feel the need and inspiration to do so... will it have consequences on larger schema of this world... most likely not... but I am more for the little differences, little moments of potential transformation in my own life and probably in lives of the others through being part of my life... we will see, what this all leads to... at this moment, I am just happy that I took this time out to sit and reflect...
signing off from Krakow... till we meet again...
The picture for this blog was obtained from the following website
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