Blogging Can Boost Your Self-Esteem
When I started blogging for the Huffington Post, I felt I had to make sure what I said was profound. Not that I didn’t think through all my posts on Burden of Greatness and Wander Woman. But Huffington is now the biggest site in the blogoshpere. I felt a responsibility to tie my opinions to current events and make important statements about social trends. Hopefully, this slant is reflected in my writing here as well.
Therefore, I put a lot of thought into my Huffington posts. I immediately received a lot of traffic. I was told that for an “unknown” my numbers were respectable. Yet the comments were mixed, from people adamantly agreeing with my views to people telling me I’m out of touch and calling me the f-word: feminist.
Most of the people that sign up for my own blogs are people I know and who like me or people who have heard me speak and who like me. They tend to see the world as I do. If they don’t, they respectfully offer an alternative perspective.
Although some of my friends have followed me to Huffington, many of my readers there are strangers. Some have become my fans. Others obviously see the world differently than I do. Some of these readers don’t like me.
At first this bothered me. My emotional triggers sparked with activity. I had cool, smart things to say. They should be praising my brilliance. I found that I wanted to explain myself and use my wit to blast them into compliance.
Then my logical brain kicked in. First, I rationalized all the remarks with “all press is good press” because I’m trying to increase my visibility. Then my trailing good sense finally had its chance to say, “If you are being true to your mission and message, then bringing out the naysayers is a good thing.” Maybe I’ll convert some of them, probably not most of them. But I have to allow for the full conversation to take place. I believe that’s the point of blogging.
Most of all, I realized I need to be strong in my resolve and my self-esteem to let these comments fly by me. I have been working on not getting hooked emotionally for years when I teach leadership classes to traditional managers in hierarchical companies. Now I have another chance to stand strong with my beliefs in the face of ridicule.
To top it off, some of these comments have opened my eyes to other possibilities. This means I am strong enough to be open to new ideas as well.
Even if you have your own blog, try guest blogging for other sites. Link your blog to Facebook. Share the link to your blog with discussion groups on LinkedIn (one of my blog posts has spawned a two-week heated discussion in a Women’s Leadership LinkedIn group). Get your ideas out into the world in new ways. Then be prepared to accept the flurry of comments with strength and grace.
Please consider sharing your comments and links to your blogs here. Then let’s all comment on each others’ ideas.
Hi Marcia,
great post. You invited sharing, so here I am.
The wonderful thing about the internet is that it allows such diversity. And the building of a tribe.
Of course the shadow to the internet is it allows the propagation of hate and all forms of violence and the building of tribes that promote this. People and groups who get pleasure from attack.
Somewhere in between these two places is the opportunity for enlightened tension.
If I think of the great sages that have walked our earth, the one thing that I admire most in them is their unwillingness to compromise on their own integrity. To be true to their word, no matter what. (and always moving closer to the light, away from the dark)
That is our task. It is not always easy. And to be able to listen with the willingness to understand anothers point of view, even if we do not like it.
Buckminster Fuller said that tension is the greatest integrity. As I hold Bucky to be one of the greatest recent examples of living in integrity, I have worked hard to understand what he meant by this quote.
Tension in a dialogue is created when there isn’t complete agreement. When everyone agrees with us, its lovely, but nothing actually happens, except we all pat each other on the back. Its during those conversations when there is a form of dissonance, or tension, that we enter a dialogue that invites us to open to new ways of thinking and being.
Homogenisation is unhealthy. “Same..same..”
Lets salute the differences…the positive deviants.
At the same time, lets also be sure to build the boundaries against outright energetic attack and to know the difference between the two.
You are doing a fabulous job, and I am loving your work,
warmly,
Christine
I enjoyed reading both your post and that of Christine’s, and seeing that I will be starting my own blog soon, am grateful for the thoughts posted.
One thing however that haunts me: where do people find the time to read and comment on all of these blogs? And what were they doing before blogs appeared?
I struggle to just find the time to read a book for pleasure, and I don’t even watch TV. I’m sure someone must have analysed what we are doing less of nowadays that allows us to be so active in front of a keyboard and screen.
Hi Lee,
I think people are starting businesses helping people to deal with the information overload! I find that I have to get very selective with what I read (basing it on my primary life and/or business purpose instead of entertainment though a laugh now and then is good). I also compartmentalize my time, scheduling reading time so it doesn’t take over my time to enjoy the weather from outside, not just my window. I used to read the newspaper. That time is gone. So I’m careful about what I add and what I delete. I will add your blog–I look forward to seeing it.