What Has Blogging Taught You?

  I read this topic on a blog called 'Better In Bulk' at http://betterinbulk.net/2010/04/what-has-blogging-taught-you.html.  I've thought about five things blogging has taught me.

-I really am growing like my blog title implies 'Zombie Evolution'.  I recently went back and read every single blog of mine starting from the first and I have developed a voice, found more of myself and I'm more confident now than when I first started.
-I'm a more social person than I realized.  I first started my blog with no intention of interacting with people, but now I have quite a social network that includes family, old friends, old high school classmates, movie companies, publishing companies, actors, writers and special effects make-up artists.
-I have a purpose more than I ever knew.  My blog started out as 'Zombie Killer's Crazy Ideas'.  It was just a way to share some of the ideas I've come up with for stories and characters.  I ran out of those in about ten blogs, but I found I had more to write about.  When I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, my blog took on a whole new life of its own.  It became as much about me as it did about my writing, but somehow it was more interesting that way.  That leads to my fourth point.
-Writing is more interesting if you don't forget the human element.  I've always known that, but I've been making more of an effort to deal with feelings in my writing more than just concepts and fanciful ideas.  My wife has helped me to figure out ways to show what a character is feeling, through descriptions of their body language, facial expressions, etc.
-And finally, I've learned the importance of friendship.  I had lost a lot of friends when I went into the Navy and I'm just now reconnecting with some of them and finding new ones.  A favorite movie quote of mine is from 'Fried Green Tomatoes' when Jessica Tandy says that the most important thing in life is friends.  I think that's a big part of why I developed the bipolar disorder while I was in the Navy.  Now it feels good to be back home in a familiar place with people who know me.  I've even found a new hero, as I blogged about yesterday: Craig Chenery.  He is involved in books and movies and is bipolar.

Reconnecting

  I ran into a sailor named Rowe.  I told him, "That's my name sometimes, depends on who you ask".  He got a kick out of that. ror  Once, when I was young, a friend of my mother's was over at our house.  She didn't speak English very well, but my mom wanted me to at least be polite and introduce myself.  I told her my name, but she kept looking at my arms.  She said, "Paur, you so chubby.  You got to eat!  You too chubby!"  I kindly nodded my head, smiled, excused myself, then went to my room and laughed my fuckin' ass off for almost half an hour straight!  Engrish as a Second Ranguage.
  You know, this Military Protective Order is a crock of shit.  My wife and I can't have any contact with each other.  How are we supposed to work things out this way?  It's like putting a cast on a severed leg that has to stay on for a month, then expecting it to somehow, magically reconnect to the body.  We'll have to figure out our own way to reconnect with each other.  I know we still love each other.
  Speaking of reconnecting, since I've had so much time on my hands, I've been been reconnecting with God, myself and with a lot of old friends.  I've been reading a lot of the Friendship With God book, as I've told you, but I've also started praying again and meditating.  I've been reconnecting with myself by thinking about what's truly important to me, talking to myself and just being with myself in general.  Last night I put on some headphones and just jammed out on some music.  I was fully giving myself to the movement, feeling, energy and rhythm of it.  I haven't done that since my college days!  It felt so amazing!
  You know, I've developed so many inhibitions over the years.  It's been terribly unhealthy.  I'm trying to let go of fear and inhibition so that I can truly just be myself.  It feels so good to just be yourself, not caring what anyone else thinks.  I hadn't checked the stats for my blogs for a while, but I checked them last night and there's a steep drop off in readership since I've changed the title of this blog.  You know what?  It didn't faze me at all.  My old goal was to become famous and have lots of adoring fans.  Now I just want to express myself without fear and without expectation or need.  Now I'm separating the fans from the friends.  Just a few days ago I didn't have any friends, but I had fans.  Now, I may not have any fans, but I've got friends.  God, I'm tearing up as I'm writing this.  I haven't had friends in such a long time.
  Speaking of friends, I've been reconnecting with some of my old buddies from middle school, high school and college on Facebook, Twitter and MySpace.  I find that I do genuinely care how they've been doing.  They're no longer just some inconsequential ballot stuffers in the great voting box of Paul's ego.  My stats can go to hell.  Jessica Tandy had it right in Fried Green Tomatoes, the most important thing in life is friends.