Mash's Musings


For whom to blog

Published Jun. 28, 2021

tl;dr definitely me, and sometimes you

Before starting to post more, I was very cognizant about who the target audience of my posts was. If nobody wanted to read it then why write at all? And what did I have to say that was both original and additive to a topic? This naturally created a very high bar which resulted in many interesting thoughts that I dismissed entirely and a few other thoughts that I had thought through in many ways but felt I couldn't polish enough to justify a post. The result? A blog with only a single post and no readers.

While discussing a slanderous blog post on the New York Times with a couple friends, I found the author's message to "just write" really hit home. Quality, correctness, and originality be damned, Rhinehart exhorts, "Write what you want to write. Write what you really think. The truth will come out." Amusingly enough my overall impression of the article was that it was poorly written and quite rambly, but that was the exact point! Despite my negative stylistic review, it had sparked a great discussion about the merits of mass media and journalism and left our little group with a great new meme about catching "octopus brain". And the beauty of it is that this article was written for no one but the author.

I see my blog as some version of this. Most of what I write are personal meditations that I like to put into the digital aether. The advice and prompts are really written for different versions of me. Realizing and remembering that liberates me from the need for perfection or to keep an audience in mind.

Hopefully these musings resonate with you in some way or another. If you think it sucks, that's great! Write about it and send me a link, or let's chat about it on our next call. If you think it's great, do the same. I see any additional thoughts outside of my own to be gravy on top. And if one of my poorly written, rambly articles sparks a discussion for your friend groups then consider me sincerely honored.