One More From Andrew Sullivan...

here:

The task of talking out loud about one’s own mistakes is a very helpful thing to do. I think it’s more helpful than pretending you know everything and proclaiming every now and again from some high horse what the truth is. Blogging is a whole new way of writing, and a new way of experiencing the world. It’s very real and very human.

That business about experiencing the world differently as a result of blogging...another of its most powerful effects. Having a place from which I could capture all the little quirky thing that happen every day was a blogging revelation. It changed the way I moved through the world, made me more observant and reflective.

Not that any of that shows in the blog itself, of course!

Comments

[Ben Tremblay]

"experiencing the world differently as a result of blogging [...] It changed the way I moved through the world, made me more observant and reflective."
Well ... colour me gob-smacked!

Last night, in response to something HRheingold wrote about Habermas and the inter-tubes I asserted that our new means of communicating don't really press towards self-development, nor towards building of authentic community. Not as practiced today, at least.
So what you've written here counters that rather dramatically ... and since my main point is about valuing subjective narrative, well, heh, I can't just try to blow you off! *grin*

If I may: I think you've captured the essence of something broader and more general ... photography comes to mind ... and that is: activity as meditative practice. (Which is what's captured by the Japanese notion of ".do", as in tai.kwon.do or, less known, kyu.do, the art of the bow. Mindful photography is known as "miksang", a Tibetan construct.)

So I'm going to loft your assertion into a different orbit, where blogging will happily co-exist with spontaneous poetry or weaving or any other principled practice. That's ok, yes?
;-)

regards
--ben

[Tom Guarriello]

Ben,

Loft away!

I, too, read Rheingold's piece about Habermas, and your reflections, as well. More thought required before commenting on yours.

As for mine, what I didn't write was that about a year after starting to blog I began posting a photo just about every Friday (a general lack of discipline has prevented me from doing so at the planned weekly interval). I did so because i wanted to engage in the kind of purposeful seeing that would lead to purposeful photography. Once or twice, I even came close. But, hey, it's a practice, so I'll just keep doing it until I stop!

Thanks for the comment.