Audience of one

Blogging is really a paradox. Essentially, you're airing out your dirty laundry online for all the world to see. The saving grace is the anonymity in this process. Some people choose to reveal themselves fully; others see fit to only give hints of their true identity.

When creating this blog, I had no clue what would happen. It was a pure experiment. AJOC in its original form is actually a bona fide collection of essays & poetry I've written over the years. It resides on my PowerBook in a folder called A Journal of Conscious. While bits & pieces are posted here intermittently, I'm in no rush to publish it as a whole, digitally or otherwise.

The project's goal was to keep its subject matter completely honest & ego-free. For the most part, those standards have been met (w/a few notable exceptions). I've also been accused of being too serious, needing to get stoned (yeah Ang - this means you), browbeating myself, etc. With such lofty benchmarks, what the fuck do you expect? Pomposity & virtuous sermonizing will inevitably creep in @ some point.

Hypercritical thoughts clog my mind about that often: are the posts too heavy & serious? Should I interject more humor or anecdotal material to "lighten the mood?" Et cetera, blah blah blah.

Truth is, I could give a shit what people think of the blog. It's not about satisfying their need for new & more entertaining fodder - it's an outlet for me to exorcise my own demons, acknowledge the sacredness in everything & (try to) make some fucking sense out of this menagerie called life. Besides, who the hell is actually reading? I have no real audience...just my friend Ang & random comment spammers once in a while.

It doesn't bother me. I neither want nor need a collection of readers who expect me to react in certain ways towards everything. Then AJOC suddenly becomes a sitcom, with formulaic plots revolving around recurring themes like girl #1, Presence & whatnot. Comments then turn into a laugh track of ego reinforcement for one type of behavior or another. The whole thing basically becomes a contrived joke.

I'll kill it before that happens.

Ironically, my very first post contains an analogy to Seinfeld. Guess we've come full circle now. This blog is not reality TV...it's a means to an end. The means is ineffectual language & mediocre prose. The end is greater awareness & less clutter in my overstimulated, paranoid little mind.

Have a nice day.