[Fallfromgrace]

I'm just curious but for those of you who frequently write do you think if you do it for yourself, or for others? Are you hoping for it to be found and read, let's face it, by your peers as a form of online facetime, or do you not care? Has it brought you any intrinsic good (just for example, friends, respect, a following, business offers, girls) or an easy avenue for trouble and shit to be used against you?

Is it public, or private? Are you transparent with the vices as well (the drinking, smoking, gambling, drugs, sleeping around), or are you going with the well-made clean cut persona?

I am going to just assume that most people who blog about their vices remain anonymous as well because it's just silly otherwise, especially for guys in this age; could get into a lot of unnecessary brushes of trouble when somebody finds it.

Don't know how many of you guys out there run blogs but I just want to get a bunch of perspectives and experiences from the kind of online writing you guys do (advice, or personal life) and how transparent you are, and how you think it might affect your audience's perception of you, and whether you blog anonymously or not.

I am 21 this year and going into college this August. I'm generally an above average student, good grades, overachiever, involved in a couple committees, activities, but I'm also a little fucked up in that I also frequently smoke up a lot alongside having a smoking and drinking habit, as well as a gambling problem. Because I'm just a young guy trying to balance out all of this and find his way in the world, I feel the need to write or I might lose myself. Personally I need to write things out to flesh out concepts or clear my head, or recap timeframes, weeks and months etc. I was thinking of starting a blog to journal my thoughts as well as function as a yardstick for my progress, but life in general is so vague I'm not sure. Of course I considered going with two blogs, a private journal for myself and a public one to maintain my good guy persona, but I doubt I'll be able to keep up with both.

Anyhow, just want to hear your experiences with writing, and if it has impacted any of you in a social aspect, and if so, how.

[Peregrine]

Keeping a journal is a great habit. Why publish it at all though? If you're writing to clear your head and track your progress, a simple Word document is more than enough.

http://www.artofmanliness.com/2009/06/07...a-journal/

[Fallfromgrace]

I did consider that, but that would mean that either all my entries would be found through scrolling down a word document. Which is tedious at best. A wordpress setting seems more friendly even to myself because it's sorted by dates and titles. It's basically convenience.

But yes you are right, I did consider not publishing anything and just keeping a private journal. I was only wondering if anyone would come in and disagree and say that there could be any merit to a public blog, anonymous or not (accountability, a congruent persona, a following of like-minded people etc).

[The Beast1]

There are templates for word that allow it to be searchable like a journal. Do some research.

Everyone and their mother has a blog. I don't see the point in highlighting your life for all to see on a public website. I'll keep my private thoughts private.

[malakaix]

(07-01-2015 06:51 AM)Fallfromgrace Wrote:  

Personally I need to write things out to flesh out concepts or clear my head, or recap timeframes, weeks and months etc. I was thinking of starting a blog to journal my thoughts as well as function as a yardstick for my progress, but life in general is so vague I'm not sure. Of course I considered going with two blogs, a private journal for myself and a public one to maintain my good guy persona, but I doubt I'll be able to keep up with both.

Anyhow, just want to hear your experiences with writing, and if it has impacted any of you in a social aspect, and if so, how.

It could be beneficial to create a blog and flesh out those concepts and clear your head through writing; but even if it's private in my experience you need a target audience.. even if no one will ever see it except you, i find it impossible to write unless i can envision some kind of vague objective audience.

I've tried blogging but i can't get into the rhythm of it when i comes to fleshing out my thoughts, i usually find myself on forums centered around specific interests of mine where i will respond while simultaneously crafting a response that would be on par with writing an article. It's easier for me because i treat it like a conversation rather then a platform to promote my writing to a specific audience.. yeah i'm weird; it just never comes out naturally when i'm writing from a blogging perspective.

I think one day i'm going to go back over my 10,000 something posts and pick apart bits and pieces to compile into something.

[travolta]

I'm not much of a blogger, but if I were to make a blog then I'd only make it around a topic that I know sells. If you don't have your own product you can sell them start off with affiliate products. For example: you find out that there are lots of affiliate offers about auto-insurance. With this in mind I'd create a blog related to cars, because I know when the blog is built up I can advertise these auto-insurance offers. Personally I wouldn't waste my time making a blog as a hobby unless you're a skilled writer like Roosh, or genuinely want to do it for fun (which I don't see how making a website is fun if you don't intend to monetize it properly). If you have no money right now then you can build up the SEO on the blog. If you do have money then send paid traffic to your blog. Collect their email addresses and market auto-insurance affiliate offers to them.