BLOGGING: FREEDOM FROM FEAR OF REJECTION

I had some vague idea about blogging but had never thought that I could enter this beautiful world!

I always had an urge to write. As a child, I wrote some poems also, but don’t know why and how I quit writing. During the study of Engineering and subsequently landing upon a so called prestigious government job, the urge to be a writer was hidden somewhere. As writing noting on official files do not require any creativity, so the only sign that I was a creative person inside was the sense of humour displayed by me in witty conversation with my kids or the funny parodies I made to inspire them to eat their food or brush their teeth.  Also, during official functions, I was tired of giving welcome speech and vote of thanks, as I was considered the most suited for this work, but never took seriously the appreciation I got for it.

After some years, when the children were old enough to provide me with spare time to write, I again ventured into writing from the spare time left from office and family.  It is not true to say that I didn’t write all through these years. The fact is, I used to write few lines on loose sheets, but when I read them after writing, I felt the only suitable place for them was the waste basket as I believed nobody was going to like them. In the MS Office era, the paper sheets were replaced by computer and instead of waste basket, recycle bin was the place where my writings landed into.

Yes, I had heard about blogging, but was not sure what it was and had never thought that I could venture into this wonderful world of blogging, until my secret world of writing was discovered by my daughter and husband. That day I wrote about an incidence about my cooking disasters. I was planning to send it to open page in a newspaper, but was finding it difficult to cut it short to the prescribed word limit. Before I could send this piece of writing to its ancestors (my previous writings), my daughter spotted the article and started laughing uncontrollably upon reading it. She showed it to my husband who showered his praises for my writing and their praises saved this piece from the recycle bin.  When I told them my problem of being unable to stick to the word limit, my daughter said,” Mamma! Why don’t you start a blog? you can write whatever you want without any word limit!” the idea seemed to be good, so I searched on goggle about blogging and this is how  my blog was born. I shared the link of my first blog post on my facebook timeline and got an encouraging response from my friends and family. By that time I was not sure that I would continue with blogging. Upon reading my first blog “My cookingdisaster: The horrible sabzi” , in which I had mentioned my daughter, my son got annoyed that I had not mentioned him on my blog. His accusations for favouring his sister continued for many days, and I was forced to write another blog post mentioning him "Admission woes”, in which I described the trauma faced by us for his admission. When my daughter and son read this, they were literally rolling on the floor laughing. i got great appreciation from my family and friends for this post.  My daughter termed this post as magnum opus of my writings. I urge my fellow bloggers to go through it.That was the day; I decided to continue with “my imperfect writings”

One day while searching on blogging, I came across Indi blogger, and tried to join it. Thanks to the Indi blogger site, it requires at least five posts in your blog to register here, so I had to increase my blog post count to 5. Upon joining the community I realised that this is altogether a different world! So many fantastic blogs to read upon and so many people who spare time to read your blog and give feedback!  Though I confess that initially I developed serious inferiority complex after reading the great writings of other bloggers. I could have quit blogging but my daughter told me,” Mamma! Why do you fear so much about people not liking your blog! It is not necessary that each blog post is liked by all. Please post whatever you write! Good or bad is for the readers to decide!”

These words had a huge impact on me! How much freedom blogging gives me! No word limit, no rejection, rather you are overwhelmed by the love and affection showered at you!

With the newly acquired confidence I sent some jokes to Readers’ Digest,  and was surprised to find them published. Then I recreated a story in Hindi which I had thrown in dustbin five years back and sent it to online Hindi magazine “Abhivyakti” for publication. After two months, when I had lost all the hopes for its publications and started doubting my writing capabilities again, I got the confirmation from the magazine editor for publication of the story. The confidence I got through few months of blogging gave me courage to submit my writings for publications which I could not do in last so many years.

And now coming on what inspires me to continue, I enjoy the freedom found through blogging. Writing always gave me satisfaction, but it was the fear of rejection which kept preventing me from writing. With a blog, I do not have to bother about the reaction of the publisher. Also, indiblogger helped me to keep me continue to blog. Upon posting my first few blog posts, I started receiving feedback from fellow bloggers. I remember how happy I felt when I received the first comment on my blog from Renu. Also, I found my fellow bloggers very encouraging. Like Anita, who suggested me to raise a ticket to indiblogger to correct the link for my blog post. Her words were always encouraging and inspired me to continue to write.  It felt like I am allowed to choose friends from all over the world. I love this world of blogging and don’t wish to depart from it.

My job gives me salary, perks, status, but the satisfaction I get through blogging is priceless. 

So friends! Please bear with me and continue to give me your feedback so that I can continue with "my imperfect writings"!