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shadowkatPondering this livejournal habit. Been considering discontinuing. Breaking it off after a while...letting the postings dwindle away slowly, bit by bit.
Why? Well it feels less rewarding then it did before somehow, less connecting.
Like, as my pal Wales would state, there's a wall of ice separating us. Or we are mostly communicating behind a wall of masks. In some ways, I miss the more personal email - that I exchanged when I had the time with a few long distant friends. Hard to keep that up as well. An email only relationship.
It might be different, I suppose, if the people I saw in my daily life, face to face, kept journals, but outside of cjlasky, none do. As time wears on, the long distance relationships falter - as they often do without real face to face contact.
So the question becomes I guess - why am I posting these entries? Why not just stop cold? Would anyone really miss me if I did? Oh maybe for the first three or four months, the people who friended me might. Then again maybe not.
Is it to play with writing? Is it to get validation? Can't be that - get few if any responses to my posts nowadays, but was certainly a factor a year ago.
Is it the safety? Safe? Online Posting? I must be nuts. But I think there is a safety to it. You get the odd thrill of someone seeing what your writing, some stranger, and the protection of the mask. Sort of like going to a masquerade party where one can talk for hours, make a complete fool of oneself even, be someone else, but no risks - since you don't know who they *really* are.
You can't see their face. Except at a party you do see their eyes. Here?
No.
Is the connection real? Yes and no. I think we can connect through art and words, yet, yet...it is an unsatisfactory one. I want more. I want more than the possibility of an email response. I feel at times as if I'm reading a story that is great, yet, doesn't quite deliver what I want - I'm left with that odd yearning. That empty gap. Like a dancer reaching for a partner who has found another better one. OR perhaps the child who sees the rainbow and races to find it's end. I did that once upon a time, raced to find the end of a rainbow. We dashed across yards and fences and swimming pools hunting it. But whenever we got close, it was always just ever so slightly out of reach.
Inaccessible.
Reading "the three wish tv genie meme" on my flist, you know the one where you state what you wish was different in your favorite tv show, reminds of the same yearning. The yearning I have when I start reading a fanfic, story, book or watch a movie - that starts wonderfully, is so filled with promise and ends exactly as the writer wished it to, yet leaves me feeling that gap. That wall of ice. That sense of disconnect. Wait. Wait. I want to say. Why did you not go that a way instead? But I don't need an answer, I know it well - it's because they are satisfying the desire in their heads and perhaps in those around them. Me? I am unseen, outside.
Never been much of a groupie I'm afraid. Not much into following the flow. Going to group meets? Makes me break out metaphorically in hives. Ack. Ack. I think. Too many people. Too many conversations. Plus, well, there's always that jarring sensation when one realizes that one's interests and views don't quite jive with the group's. As a child - I remember my best friend at the time informing me that we needed to change our style, our interests, our tastes, in order to "fit" in. I remember backing away, slowly. I've joined many groups in my life time, stayed with none of them, a dilettant, dabbling.
But each one without exception unnerved me after a certain point in time.
There was the inevitable clash of personality, the pressure to conform.
I see it here as well in the internet world with its music swapping, file sharing, icons building, etc. And I feel the disconnect. The inevitable wall of ice. The sense...that somehow, I can't quite conform to the group dynamic.
Something in me, prevents it - does not want it.
It's a feeling that is hard to describe in words, this weird feeling of loneliness in a world filled with people. This weird disconnect...
And yet, even with the disconnect, the wall of ice, I still post entries, like an alcoholic who says this will be their last drink or the cigarette smoker who is always about to quit. A friend told me recently that the internet became my drug [or more to the point the discussion boards then later live journal] in 2002. I believe they are right. The question is...can I or should I go off of it, stop, quit?
I think these things while investigating taking Salsa classes.
Why? Well it feels less rewarding then it did before somehow, less connecting.
Like, as my pal Wales would state, there's a wall of ice separating us. Or we are mostly communicating behind a wall of masks. In some ways, I miss the more personal email - that I exchanged when I had the time with a few long distant friends. Hard to keep that up as well. An email only relationship.
It might be different, I suppose, if the people I saw in my daily life, face to face, kept journals, but outside of cjlasky, none do. As time wears on, the long distance relationships falter - as they often do without real face to face contact.
So the question becomes I guess - why am I posting these entries? Why not just stop cold? Would anyone really miss me if I did? Oh maybe for the first three or four months, the people who friended me might. Then again maybe not.
Is it to play with writing? Is it to get validation? Can't be that - get few if any responses to my posts nowadays, but was certainly a factor a year ago.
Is it the safety? Safe? Online Posting? I must be nuts. But I think there is a safety to it. You get the odd thrill of someone seeing what your writing, some stranger, and the protection of the mask. Sort of like going to a masquerade party where one can talk for hours, make a complete fool of oneself even, be someone else, but no risks - since you don't know who they *really* are.
You can't see their face. Except at a party you do see their eyes. Here?
No.
Is the connection real? Yes and no. I think we can connect through art and words, yet, yet...it is an unsatisfactory one. I want more. I want more than the possibility of an email response. I feel at times as if I'm reading a story that is great, yet, doesn't quite deliver what I want - I'm left with that odd yearning. That empty gap. Like a dancer reaching for a partner who has found another better one. OR perhaps the child who sees the rainbow and races to find it's end. I did that once upon a time, raced to find the end of a rainbow. We dashed across yards and fences and swimming pools hunting it. But whenever we got close, it was always just ever so slightly out of reach.
Inaccessible.
Reading "the three wish tv genie meme" on my flist, you know the one where you state what you wish was different in your favorite tv show, reminds of the same yearning. The yearning I have when I start reading a fanfic, story, book or watch a movie - that starts wonderfully, is so filled with promise and ends exactly as the writer wished it to, yet leaves me feeling that gap. That wall of ice. That sense of disconnect. Wait. Wait. I want to say. Why did you not go that a way instead? But I don't need an answer, I know it well - it's because they are satisfying the desire in their heads and perhaps in those around them. Me? I am unseen, outside.
Never been much of a groupie I'm afraid. Not much into following the flow. Going to group meets? Makes me break out metaphorically in hives. Ack. Ack. I think. Too many people. Too many conversations. Plus, well, there's always that jarring sensation when one realizes that one's interests and views don't quite jive with the group's. As a child - I remember my best friend at the time informing me that we needed to change our style, our interests, our tastes, in order to "fit" in. I remember backing away, slowly. I've joined many groups in my life time, stayed with none of them, a dilettant, dabbling.
But each one without exception unnerved me after a certain point in time.
There was the inevitable clash of personality, the pressure to conform.
I see it here as well in the internet world with its music swapping, file sharing, icons building, etc. And I feel the disconnect. The inevitable wall of ice. The sense...that somehow, I can't quite conform to the group dynamic.
Something in me, prevents it - does not want it.
It's a feeling that is hard to describe in words, this weird feeling of loneliness in a world filled with people. This weird disconnect...
And yet, even with the disconnect, the wall of ice, I still post entries, like an alcoholic who says this will be their last drink or the cigarette smoker who is always about to quit. A friend told me recently that the internet became my drug [or more to the point the discussion boards then later live journal] in 2002. I believe they are right. The question is...can I or should I go off of it, stop, quit?
I think these things while investigating taking Salsa classes.
no subject
Date: 2005-04-18 08:09 pm (UTC)I think we can connect through art and words, yet, yet...it is an unsatisfactory one. I want more. I want more than the possibility of an email response. I feel at times as if I'm reading a story that is great, yet, doesn't quite deliver what I want - I'm left with that odd yearning. That empty gap.
I have talked about this too. The part that is missing from these interactions. My husband thinks this is an easier way to interact without the real person present. But I disagree with that. There is a certain tangible that is missing I would agree, but there is a sharing that is more real and more profound sometimes than in many real life interactions. What that says about the quality of RL interactions is another story. I think this is another way to communicate that has its flaws. We have all seen and experienced those. But what I receive from this is incredible. I have realized so much about my fellow humans from these interactions that in many ways I did not know it was possible, except with some of my closest friends.
And this whole addiction conversation that I see creeping in lately has concerned me. Why when someone receives something positive do they think there is something the matter with it? More and more I see entries concerned with the addictive qualities of this medium. Why don’t we say that about reading, which is what I would be doing more of if I wasn’t online. I don’t think we have to worry about that as long as it isn’t interfering with life. When something gives you support when you haven’t it elsewhere, then I think that is a good thing. Not something to be feared. Personally, I am glad I found your website and read your essays. The personal aspects that came through, and still do in your lj and in entries like this, I think are a miraculous sharing of yourself. That is a good thing at least from my perspective. I am glad you post!!
I do think there is an evolution of sorts going on and I don’t know what that means. People do come and go but I think friendships have been built and like all friendships, intent keeps them alive. But I want to find out what happens next too!
no subject
Date: 2005-04-19 03:14 pm (UTC)I guess the question is to what extent is it positive and to what extent does it interfer with your life. Like anything, it's not a problem until it takes over your life, distracts you from other pursuits that may result in love, career success, published novel, physical activity. TV is not bad thing in of itself, but it you are spending 50%-80% of your time watching it and not exploring other avenues? Than it has become something more than a harmless pursuit. The same is true with the internet - and once again it depends on how you are spending time on it. What you are doing. Are you interacting? Meeting new people? Or...using it as your sole connection to others? I know of marriages that have collasped because one person spent all their time on the net.
I suppose a better way of explaining all this - would be to tell you about one of my greatest fears. That of being stuck. Trapped.
Whether it be physically, mentally, or emotionally. I fear not changing.
I fear not evolving. I fear being stuck in a rut just as much as I fear being stuck in a small space.
Yet at the same time, I fear the change. That what comes next won't be as good as what came before. The loss of what was. It's an odd contradiction I know. I hang onto the comfort zone, yet at the same time berate myself for doing so.
For me the internet is a weird thing - it provides me with a public platform for my writing. A free soap-box, the only price? The occassional crass word of criticism - which happens rarely now that I've confined my postings to livejournal. Yet, you can get lazy here. It's comfortable, safe. I write what I will. True it is upsetting when no one responds. And being a competitive nit, I tend to get annoyed when other writers get 100 responses and I get a woeful five - which is in a way my own fault since I'm horrid at responding and update rarely. But outside of that? There's really no downside, is there? Except - that after a while it interferred with my ability to write things that could be published outside of the livejournal. My own tales. My own stories. Which I'm slowly reclaiming, bit by bit - by forcing myself to work on in lieu of writing a personal post.
I don't think livejournal is the same experience for everyone. But nothing is, is it? It's a happy retreat for some, an addiction for others.