Do Real-Life People Blog?

Annie's post hit on something that I was talking with my friend Justin Jackson about after he published his 2024 year in review post. It's very normal among my online friends to post year in reviews of all kinds for anyone to read. And I assume it's also very normal for people to privately journal, that kind of thing. But among my real life friends, I don't know a single one that posts any of that online other than an Instagram slideshow template. Why blog instead of journal?

I write on my blog to get thoughts outta my head and somewhere else. The main reason I don't just journal it privately is that I'm not motivated to write in a journal the same way I am with a blog. I write on my blog when I figured something out. If I went through the trouble of learning how to fix or do something, someone else might need that someday, and nine times outta 10, that's someone as me because I forget what I did and end up finding my own blog post.

I read in my blog about things I like or enjoy, whether it's music, technology, movies or TV shows, a book, my kids shoveling the driveway. I try to limit my complaints about the world to the 280 characters in most social media posting boxes, because that feels like enough negativity. Sometimes it spills over into a longer blog post, but only when I feel like I can stand behind it long term.

I am also just vain enough to hope that someone else out in the world might appreciate or agree with my point of view, that by saying it out loud online, someone else might have the courage to go say what they want to say out loud as well. Context matters. Going back to Annie's post, I resonated very much with this paragraph. Very occasionally one of my friends or acquaintances will mention something I wrote on my blog and that is a weird moment for me. Like, what? You read that crazy?

I guess I don't expect anything I write to leave the small online circle line habit. So if it shows up in the small offline circle line habit, it's odd. Like when you have two different friends groups and they all show up at the same party. End quote.

I've realized over my years of being very online that real life friends often miss context for why something is interesting or important enough for me to write a blog post, tweet, or record a podcast episode about something that's a huge deal in the Apple online world rarely escapes containment enough to be a topic at dinner with my extended family, for example.

And even when political news crosses over, I rarely have to worry that any of my real life friends or family have read what I've written online. But sometimes parts of me wishes they did because it could be an interesting conversation starter to dive deeper from my a thousand words on a given topic. Could be a diving board into some deeper water we might be able to get into, which is why you should start a blog.

Lately I've been trying to encourage people to start a blog, both online friends as well as real life friends. I really believe it sharpens my mind to have to string together words to form coherent sentences, as well as write something I know might be seen by another human who might ask me what I, who might ask me about what I've written, or send me a spelling correction note going back to Annie's post once more.

In quotes, it's kind of a shame that my real life friends don't blog because if they did, their blogs would be interesting and kind and creative and funny, and it's too bad. My blogging friends don't live close to me in physical terms because they're also interesting and kind and creative and funny. We'd have some good parties, end quote. In addition to blog, I'd add podcasting or YouTube if they're inclined to speak more than write a blog post.

Being willing to be vulnerable enough to show up and be seen having at least some of your opinions and thoughts out in the wild for others to see. Brene Brown's inspiration from Theodore Roosevelt's man in the arena. Speech comes to mind, quote, this is who I want to be. I want to create, I wanna make things that didn't exist before I touch them. I wanna show up and be seen in my work and in my life. And if you're gonna show up and be seen, there's only one guarantee.

And that is you'll get your ass kicked if you're gonna go in the arena and spend any time in there whatsoever, especially if you're committing to creating in your life, you'll get your ass kicked. If courage is a value that we hold, this is a consequence. You can't avoid it.