Of Public Diaries, and Certain Postulated Effects They May Have On a Diarist
There are numerous syndromes specific to the culture of a particular nation, at a particular time in history. (The Wikipedia portal listing Culture-specific Syndromes makes interesting reading; note that some of these pages are not cited: whatever this means, or does not mean, to you...) But the groups that constitute a "culture" don't have to be nationally-based...particularly in this century, when communication over the global Internet makes for the erosion of those borders and the creation of new ones.
We define ourselves by origin. We define ourselves by the appearance we choose to have and also by what time and space do to us without our choice. By how we select media that entertain us...what we call "taste" or "style". And how we choose to spend our time.
I postulate a syndrome with possible psychological effects upon bloggers, diarists and journallers - in particular those whom one could describe as being introspective but also unabashed - the sort of individuals who reveal on a regular basis certain sorts of personal details about their lives to both the "Faceless Public" and the fixed quantity of "Known Personages" to that person.
Part of what I believe to have been limiting me may have been a side-effect of my tendency to Keep Nothing Hidden...something I've always compulsively done. Leaving aside my notions of why this may be I note more importantly that this practice does seem to have, in a cumulative sort of way, fostered the impression I've been trying to prove SOMETHING, whether to myself or to the Externum...or to both.
Since these two things mesh indistinctly when someone's diary becomes an open door, if not at least somewhat self-censored, I think perhaps it can be damaging in ways an author will likely never intended--and may have not manage to realise.
To hide certain things does not have to be done out of shame. It can be done as a strategy...and there are aspects to that "strategy" which involve more depth than merely "editing one's public image" more circumspectly.
When people keep diaries, they do so for all sorts of reasons and a lot of them have nothing to do with public image, or we'd never have bothered keeping diaries before there was an Internet to put them on. The practice of making THOSE things public has side-effects, and while some of them are reasonably positive, others aren't.
I decided that there's no need for extensive self-editing so long as I adhere to one rule: that descriptions of my state are not something to make public.
I am not likely to take the time to go back and edit past entries to reflect this, but future writings in which I mostly am cataloguing how I'm feeling and why are things I'm either not going to write, or if there's a great deal of drive to write them, I'm going to snap the "privacy bit" to ON.
Too much "honesty" can be about as bad as not enough, sometimes. By keeping what dips in and out of being a "magical diary" decidedly un-private, I can end up programming situations that lead to things happening, and excessive focus falling upon certain things which would not otherwise be that way were I not doing that one thing quite so compulsively.
I've allowed the earlier entry today to remain public because it was refreshingly positive; if this practice will be ceased it might as well be on such a note...but it's not just negative statements about my state that can have the syndrome-effect.
It would do me well to avoid making a habitual catalogue of my state no matter what it is and whether such a catalogue is broadcast to the outside world or not.
Most of the time what I've been doing is writing what has been merely travelogue-like descriptions of states of mind. GOOD artists DON'T WRITE LIKE THAT. They don't merely render a message of "I'm feeling ________" - they remind you of when YOU felt that way.
Writing should result from whatever state I find myself in, instead of being a mere description of it. If I'm feeling dark, for example...whatever gets written should NOT be statements about the experience of that feeling but rather be examples drawn from that experience. You don't get "art" by writing a list of places where you travel. You get it from collecting the artifacts of that zone, and assembling them so as to reveal specific qualities of whatever zone is being wandered.
Expository statements don't do this. They categorically refer to ME. They're non-transferable. I see two very bad things about that. One of them is that it's self-perpetuating, and the other is that it's boring.
These are both bad things for both Self and Outside to be viewing.
By merely cataloguing the conditions of Mind, I end up inadvertently making definitive statements about those conditions, underlining them, and sealing them. By veering away from this practice I'd end up avoiding lending such undue, excessive weight to them.
Defining one's state with a statement makes of it one's "mental state" by default; it prolongs it, and underscores it, in ways that can be BAD. Some pf these ways are obvious--others far less so, but no less bad.
This can be true even when it's NOT a "bad" state being catalogued.
In addition to being having fewer unintended bad side-effects, this will also lead to the practice of writing things that are more interesting to read.
And this is a good thing,..whether the reader is in the Externum, or the reader is the self.
We define ourselves by origin. We define ourselves by the appearance we choose to have and also by what time and space do to us without our choice. By how we select media that entertain us...what we call "taste" or "style". And how we choose to spend our time.
I postulate a syndrome with possible psychological effects upon bloggers, diarists and journallers - in particular those whom one could describe as being introspective but also unabashed - the sort of individuals who reveal on a regular basis certain sorts of personal details about their lives to both the "Faceless Public" and the fixed quantity of "Known Personages" to that person.
Part of what I believe to have been limiting me may have been a side-effect of my tendency to Keep Nothing Hidden...something I've always compulsively done. Leaving aside my notions of why this may be I note more importantly that this practice does seem to have, in a cumulative sort of way, fostered the impression I've been trying to prove SOMETHING, whether to myself or to the Externum...or to both.
Since these two things mesh indistinctly when someone's diary becomes an open door, if not at least somewhat self-censored, I think perhaps it can be damaging in ways an author will likely never intended--and may have not manage to realise.
To hide certain things does not have to be done out of shame. It can be done as a strategy...and there are aspects to that "strategy" which involve more depth than merely "editing one's public image" more circumspectly.
When people keep diaries, they do so for all sorts of reasons and a lot of them have nothing to do with public image, or we'd never have bothered keeping diaries before there was an Internet to put them on. The practice of making THOSE things public has side-effects, and while some of them are reasonably positive, others aren't.
I decided that there's no need for extensive self-editing so long as I adhere to one rule: that descriptions of my state are not something to make public.
I am not likely to take the time to go back and edit past entries to reflect this, but future writings in which I mostly am cataloguing how I'm feeling and why are things I'm either not going to write, or if there's a great deal of drive to write them, I'm going to snap the "privacy bit" to ON.
Too much "honesty" can be about as bad as not enough, sometimes. By keeping what dips in and out of being a "magical diary" decidedly un-private, I can end up programming situations that lead to things happening, and excessive focus falling upon certain things which would not otherwise be that way were I not doing that one thing quite so compulsively.
I've allowed the earlier entry today to remain public because it was refreshingly positive; if this practice will be ceased it might as well be on such a note...but it's not just negative statements about my state that can have the syndrome-effect.
It would do me well to avoid making a habitual catalogue of my state no matter what it is and whether such a catalogue is broadcast to the outside world or not.
Most of the time what I've been doing is writing what has been merely travelogue-like descriptions of states of mind. GOOD artists DON'T WRITE LIKE THAT. They don't merely render a message of "I'm feeling ________" - they remind you of when YOU felt that way.
Writing should result from whatever state I find myself in, instead of being a mere description of it. If I'm feeling dark, for example...whatever gets written should NOT be statements about the experience of that feeling but rather be examples drawn from that experience. You don't get "art" by writing a list of places where you travel. You get it from collecting the artifacts of that zone, and assembling them so as to reveal specific qualities of whatever zone is being wandered.
Expository statements don't do this. They categorically refer to ME. They're non-transferable. I see two very bad things about that. One of them is that it's self-perpetuating, and the other is that it's boring.
These are both bad things for both Self and Outside to be viewing.
By merely cataloguing the conditions of Mind, I end up inadvertently making definitive statements about those conditions, underlining them, and sealing them. By veering away from this practice I'd end up avoiding lending such undue, excessive weight to them.
Defining one's state with a statement makes of it one's "mental state" by default; it prolongs it, and underscores it, in ways that can be BAD. Some pf these ways are obvious--others far less so, but no less bad.
This can be true even when it's NOT a "bad" state being catalogued.
In addition to being having fewer unintended bad side-effects, this will also lead to the practice of writing things that are more interesting to read.
And this is a good thing,..whether the reader is in the Externum, or the reader is the self.