Year 1: How Blogging Has Made Me Less Confident

HAPPY 1 YEAR BLOGIVERSARY 
TO
MY LOWERCASE LIFE!!

We've made it people! We've beat the odds, whatever those may be, and we survived a whole year!

I feel a little bit proud of myself, okay I feel a lot proud of myself, for making it this far! I normally get distracted by shinny new objects, like a raccoon, and don't stick to a hobby very long. Okay, so maybe a raccoon is not the most flattering thing to compare myself to in this situation, but it's better than comparing myself to a pack rat! Although, now that I think about it, a pack rack might be a better comparison when it comes to my shiny new hobbies. I'm kind of what you might call...umm...a hobby collector? What that means is I have a million and one different hobbies and projects that I'm currently working on. Sadly most of said hobbies and projects lay unfinished in the path of my forgotten memories. And by that I mean I forget about them and leave them in an ever growing path around my apartment. I have hobby debris thrown in my bedroom, the living room, basement, and I even have some junk stuck out in my car. It's terrible. Thankfully blogging is a little less messy than some of my other eccentric hobbies (like right now I'm trying to become an expert knot tyer and a marine biologist. I have rope and fish books all over the place) and I haven't abandoned blogging yet, so it's not in that pile of forgotten memories or whatever mumbo jumo I spun a few sentences ago. 

Oh boy! That paragraph kind of got away from me... You would think after blogging for a whole year I'd be much better at this! Now, where was I going with this post? Oh, yes!  One year of blogging.

When I started this blog, I wasn't really sure what I was getting myself into. I was bored and had nothing better to do, so I thought "why not?" I had recently started following few blogs for the first time (I know I'm a little behind the times, but not that much, blogging only started around the 1990s) and it was all so new and exciting for me. I didn't have any real goals or plans as far as my blog went. I kinda dove in head first. It has been a true "uncharted journey" (as I so eloquently put in my About Me page. The things I come up with...). 

For me, and probably you as well, I've found this blog to be a hodgepodge mess of funny and slightly embarrassing stories from my life and travels, a emotional roller coaster full of my joys and trials, unusually placed poems and fiction from my vast imagination, a strange compilation of lists of things I like and dislike, and a little bit of my crazy thrown in (okay, so maybe a lot of my crazy thrown in). Let's just say you can come here everyday and never really know what you're going to find.

As far as the journey goes I've learned A LOT about myself though blogging. More then I could ever have anticipated. One thing I said to myself when I started this blog was that I'd always be honest. With you and with myself. Being honest with you is the easy part. I can tell you guys absolutely anything! You are best listeners! Being honest with myself on the other hand is hard. It's easy to brush off thoughts and emotions without giving them a second thought, especially the darker scarier ones. The ones about things that go bump in the night.  Those are the hard truths to face. Truths about myself I didn't know existed until I forced myself to write them down. Our words have power. Words make things real. Blogging had made me see myself in a different light. I'm darker and more messed up then I realized and that slightly terrifies me. I don't really know myself as well as I thought I did. What other things could I be hiding from myself? Maybe I'm not as smart and funny as I think? Maybe I'm not as nice as I think? Maybe everybody hates me? I guess you could say blogging has made me question myself. I'm less confident about myself as a person than I was a year ago. I've found that I have fears and flaws just like everyone else. I am human! Who knew?!? Not me. I like to think that I'm above humanly flaws and failures (would this be considered stuck up?). I know Mona will be shocked as I am. She thinks I'm perfect!

So while I may find myself less confident than I was a year ago, I am happier. Now I know you may be doubting this with my post about depression the other day, but it's true. Forcing myself to write about my depression, admitting that it was real, freed me from the lies I was telling myself. I had to face my fears. And for that I'm lighter. Happier. I may know more about flaws and failures, but I'm okay with that. I'm glad for it. I can be less confident in myself and happier knowing more about myself at the same time. If that makes any sense at all. Maybe blogging has really made me go crazy and I just haven't realized it yet!

Before I let you go, there is one more thing I discovered about myself through blogging this year! I am a lot weirder than I ever thought I was. Some of the things I say? Don't tell me you haven't noticed? Oh well. I guess I'll embrace that too.

So, thank you for sticking around and joining me on this crazy journey of my self discovery. With this new year of blogging afoot, I hope to set off proudly as a less confident, happier, weirder, and just as crazy as always blogger! Cheers to years to come!