First, a big thank you to Sue for letting me ramble on her blog. Hopefully my jumble of words won’t tarnish her blog.
Have you ever wondered about why we blog? Like sat down and thought about why millions of people post a billions of word per day? Is it an attempt to reach Internet fame and wealth? Is it simply for the pleasure of writing? Is it to market our products to others? I find it an interesting question to contemplate and of course I have my own ideas as to why we blog.
When I tried the college thing, a friend of mine told me about one of his classes. The topic was gender studies, covering behavioral differences between men and women. From my own observations the behaviors that we attribute to men or women are really shared by both. There are some differences but overall not as many as people think. Men can be irrational as women. Women can be as assertive as men. Both share doubts and insecurities and can even have body image issues. This is because we all are human and we share the same behaviors but we simply manifest them differently.
My friend told me about a scenario that might seem familiar to some of you. A man and woman are preparing for a special evening out. They are in the process of getting dressed in their fancy duds, when the woman comes out of the closet holding two pairs of shoes. She asks, “What pair of shoes should I wear tonight?” My friend then told me the reason he was given. The woman doesn’t really care about the man’s opinion, chances are she already knows. She asks because she wants to have a conversation about the shoes. She wants to talk about shoes, something she cares about with someone she cares about.
A different scenario that I am sure that you have all shared in some manner. A person is at home with family eating chocolate chip cookies and gets thirsty. She goes to the fridge and pulls out the milk, because what goes better with chocolate chip cookies than milk? She pours the milk into a glass and takes a gulp. The family watches as her face becomes scrunched up from the foul taste of spoiled milk. She says, to the closest family member, “This milk tastes awful. Taste it!” I call this Sharing Spoiled Milk Syndrome. Chances are no one is going to take up the offer to taste it. Why as people do we do this? I believe we do this because we are seeking validation of our opinion, not that we want to foist rotten food upon our family.
This is why we blog. We all want to have conversations with people about the things we love and have our opinions validated. We all are out there seeking attention; clamoring like a child showing his drawing to his mother hoping she validates his work. And there is the rub, there are thousands of us out there wanting to have conversations about the things we like, but how many of us stop and listen to what others want to talk about? From my experiences it is very little.
I have noticed many blog posts of my blogging friends, where they share something they have done that they think is neat but it hardly gets any traction. A few likes and zero comments. I know from my personal experiences very few people comment on the banners I create for my blogs and that is what I want to talk about: my experiences using GIMP to craft a fun looking banner. I love making banners and sharing them with all of you and, yeah, I do want my work validated.
I love to chat. If we were to meet in person I would be super quiet until I warmed up to you and then you won’t be able to get me to shut up. My family totem is a chipmunk for a reason. There is one thing I have noticed, if I share posts about feeling miserable or depressed people will comment. I will get sympathy and virtual hugs. This feels great; I am finally getting attention. It’s also why I don’t post about my struggles anymore. I feel it enforces bad behavior on my part, because it incentivizes me to make all my posts about how miserable I am, just so people will chat with me. I don’t want that. I want to have conversations about the things I do because that is what I enjoy. I feel this is true for many of us. We want people to notice the things we do and have conversations about it, because that is what we enjoy.
A very important part of communication is to simply listen, even if we do not care about the subject. If we listen and ask questions of people, we will find friendship. That’s what friends do, they listen and ask questions of us and it is important that we return the favor. An experiment to try for a few days is to not blog and just read other people’s blogs and then leave a comment, even if we do not care about the subject matter. Let them know you appreciate the things they do. Validate their parking.
With that I shall leave you with this video, it is long, but worth it:
Links:
Sue Vincent's Daily Echo 
Thanks again Sue! 🙂
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My pleasure Bradley 🙂
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Very interesting read. I think many bloggers blog for the interaction. For me, one of the key elements of blogging is to build a blogging community which involves responding and/or acknowledging all comments left on any of my posts. I’ve often left comments or questions on blogs that go unanswered and for me, that is being ignored. If I don’t unfollow the blog then I will stop leaving comments if I know if the author is not going to respond.
However, like Bradley says, we also need to visit other blogs, comment on their posts and become a part of their blogging community. Many people have asked me for help in this area “Why does nobody comment on or like my posts?” and it is often the case because they tell me they do not have the time to visit and read other blogs.
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Yeah, exactly. I always try to make sure I respond to comments (unless I think it might be spam, sometimes it is hard to tell). I do understand how people get super busy and they might not respond and I do make exceptions for people who get lots of comments on their blog. I mean if I had a post that suddenly had 30 comments on it, it would take me awhile to go through that. I should have mentioned this too, we do have lives outside our blogs. Lots of good stuff here. Thanks for the comment! 🙂
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I think that this is a wonderful reassssson for blogging. To connect with others across the world, and to chat with them
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Ohh, you know that is a great point, around the world. I didn’t even bring that up but chatting with people across borders has been a fantastic experience. I love reading international blogs (well, the ones who write in English, bless them). I always come away learning something new. Thanks for the comment! 🙂
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Very sage observations. Great post.
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Thank you! And odd, I thought I was following you, well that’s been fixed. Sometimes I think either I am losing my mind or the WordPress Reader has a mind of its own.
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WP has pulled that on many people. I see long term friends following my blog after several years, and I know WP struck again.
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Oh good, I thought for sure I was going crazy. Oh well, one more thing to add to my list of WP complaints.
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I think your banner is cute!
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Thank you! 😀
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I like the banner also. Good piece and I enjoyed the film. Have a great day. 🙂 — Suzanne Joshi
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Thank you! Yeah, I discovered the film after I had written my post and titled it, it fit so perfectly. Hope you have a great day as well. 🙂
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Interesting about getting comments when you talk about bad stuff. One of my most read and responded to posts related to someone I knew who’d died. As it happens, we weren’t very close, but it sparked off a whole load of memories. There were several “sorry for your loss” comments, which I actually felt were undeserved.
But I guess the general theme of your post is right. I do read other people’s posts as much as I think I can (we all have finite time available), and comment and share when I think it’s appropriate, but I’ll try to do it more.
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Yeah, time is a big thing. As much as I would love to be able to keep up with everyone’s post, I do need sleep and other activities. It is all part of being human. Definitely an important thing to keep in mind.
I think when people share bad things in there life, it is part of normal human behavior to try and comfort in some manner. Provide support. But how much better would it be if we provided support for each other when we are flying high, kind of likes ducks in a v. Hmm, that could be a whole other post. Imagine the distances we could soar!
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I’m with you on that soaring thing!
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Internet fame and glory…that’s why I’m here! Well, it was either that, or because my friends and family got sick and tired of Facebook feeds filled with pictures of Choppy, so I put them elsewhere so those who want to enjoy can, and those who don’t can pretend that they visit when we see each other.
Seriously, though, I do think validation is a key. I have a lot of blogs on the list of those I follow who stopped blogging after a few weeks or months. I’m guessing most would say that they weren’t getting feedback, or enough feedback, and it is difficult to go on without that validation of what they are doing and putting out there.
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Choppy must be the best of sports for all those pictures. 😀
Yeah, I know what you mean with people who stop blogging like that. I think part of might be sometimes blogging feels like a full time job and when it gets to that point, they need a break and then they never come back. It’s sad. 😦
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It is sad – I still miss several bloggers who just up and never came back.
And Choppy is an excellent sport. Though she may be in it for the treats, and just humors me.
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I loved this post. It’s so true, we make common bonds with someone when we initiate a conversation about something we share interest in.
Everybody just needs a little validation. Kindness goes a long way. Loved the video! 🙂
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Thank you! And yeah that video was a fantastic find. Glad someone made it! 🙂
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Absolutely! 🙂 And great blog!
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Thank you! 🙂
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