Why I write. And continue to write.

So, sometimes I disappear for weeks, or at times, months on end.  However, I always come back.  For the past almost 6.5 years I have been coming back to blogging again and again.

There are many reasons why I blog regularly (or try to anyways) and although I so cherish and appreciate the comments I receive, feedback I get, encouragement, positivity, and sense of community from my readers -- many of the reasons I write have to do with me, and very little with you.  I use this as a place to reflect, to organize my thoughts, to chronicle back where I have been, and as a place to record and remember.

Another one of the big reasons that I write here is just for the sake of writing.  I love writing (for many of the reasons listed above) and it is also a big part of my professional career, as is storytelling, and building relationships.

It is fun for me to try and exercise different types of writing, different ways of telling a story, of chronicling a trip or of re-living an experience.  If you notice, I try a lot of different things from bullet point entries, to timeline stories, to writing letters.  It is very interesting to me to use you guys as little guinea pigs to see what sticks, what people like to hear about, and what posts are a bore.  For those of you that follow me on Instagram, it is interesting what pictures get the most likes that I post (for the selfie haters out there -- I usually post more selfies because they get more likes!) and I like learning from/noticing the differences in interactions based on time of day I post, captions, etc.  The same goes for what I post to my Facebook page.  I just think this stuff is so fascinating, so I guess it suits me well that I work in the world of digital communications as well.

Anyways, I mentioned last night on Facebook that I've been missing you guys.  So, yes, you are a big reason why I continue to come back as well!  Lately, I've been missing the support and sense of community as I've been struggling to get back into the swing of eating healthy.  And, I recently had the realization that while I feel really comfortable typing publicly about my struggle to maintain a balanced diet, it's sometimes hard for me to open up to people in my day to day life about it.  Not usually, but sometimes, it makes me nervous to share that side of me.

Maybe its the "anonymity" of the internet (which is often talk about in a negative sense) but when I write here, I don't see the faces or thoughts of the people reading, so I am more comfortable sharing difficult topics.  Sometimes putting something out into the world gives me a sense of relief (for those of you who follow PostSecret, you know this can be very powerful.)  I like sharing with you all as it is a form of therapy for me!

Free therapy, preserved memories, a place to think, a place to practice a craft and hone a skill, a place to be myself.  Why do I disappear from here for so long all the time?!