[I wrote this post quite a while back, but the trigger to post is Cyn’s recent post of a similar nature]
Those of you who read my other blog – brants, know the site by now. When I announced it on twitter at that point of time, Twilight Fairy‘s immediate response was “mubarakein! so finally you use ur real name in the virtual world 😛 :)” I told her, that the real name already existed in the virtual world – Facebook, LinkedIn, but I had an inkling of what she meant, because I felt a twinge when I took ‘brants’ out of the manuscrypts domain. Though I did not dwell on it, it was a defining moment for me in its own way. I did dwell on whether I should write this post, and you now know the result.
I checked the names on my blogroll and was reassured to find a few handles that are just that – handles, not names. Maybe we’re from a different generation of bloggers. Ones who blogged for reasons that were utterly different from the reasons now. That’s generalising, yes, but there was something then about virtuality that offered a haven from reality. Some have moved on, some have clung on, and some have just drifted on, like me.
As a handle, ‘manuscrypts’ has been in existence for more than half a dozen years now. Long before the blog, there were chatrooms. Then came the blog, and while it was a personal one, over a period of time, the persona slowly overshadowed the personality, my picture does not exist on the blogs, the M symbol does. Actually, I think its a bit more complicated. A part of me is vastly different from my overt personality. The blog became an ideal location for this rarely revealed (only when I’m very comfortable with people) personality to manifest itself. So its more than just a handle. It was a world in itself.
This was the only place the persona had, and I realise that I’ve been trying to shield ‘manuscrypts’, but I got carried away. Let me explain. Its to do with what Ideasmith calls the personality of a blog. Thanks to the shielding, the blog has come to dictate what kind of posts appear here – the kind of humour, the kind of seriousness, its all getting stereotyped? Conformity within non conformity. But manuscrypts wasn’t supposed to be constrained. Where once I wrote stuff even if it sounded fun only to myself, these days, I think before I post. I wonder if the jokes sound stale, I wonder if the puns are too subtle. I wonder if I’m being funny enough. I obsess. I’m guarded. I measure. I even wonder if i play to the gallery, yes, both of you. 🙂 And I’m not sure I like that.
Meanwhile, six years is a long time, the world and the real personality have been at work too. In the real world, we now build personal brands online. 🙂 We don’t have to, but it helps. That partly explains the reason that I shifted the ‘work’ content to a different domain altogether. It was a significant step – a giving in to reality. The real and the virtual moving towards each other. And while I could have kept the two domains thoroughly apart, without the person connecting them, I didn’t see a point. Both are facets of my personality.
And while that was happening, a life has also been evolving. New interests, old interests rekindled, new people, new experiences, new avenues to be explored, all of it to be done in reality. Many times, a post has come up here only thanks to self discipline. For something like blogging, i don’t know if that’s a good thing. There is a power struggle between my own evolution and the expectations I have set for myself on this blog. I think that is pretty dumb and pompous for a little blog. There, i make it all easy for you – you just have to agree. 🙂
So I saw it coming, actually even before I wrote this. But sometimes, something becomes so much of a focal point, that you stop thinking about it objectively. For me, it was the blog/s. But these days, I wonder if you have as much fun here as you used to earlier. And I have to confess, it does make me feel inadequate, helpless, and strangely, old. Not old enough to quit blogging, but old enough to wonder whether churning out 5 posts a week (both domains included) was the best way, for everyone concerned. And that’s not including the microblogging. (self hosted, so you can comment)
So erm, that was what all this was about. To tell you in the only rambling fashion I know, that I am going to reduce the frequency here, maybe once a week, so that I free up a little more time for myself, to do things that I don’t want to postpone and regret later, to figure out things for myself, to let myself roam a bit, to see if i can reach a state which the persona and the person will be happy about, all without having to worry if the blog will be updated.
And for those kind people have been reading manuscrypts from the time he was only a little handle, he still lives, at least for now, and thinks there’s no page like home. 🙂
until next time, handling it 🙂
I call it growing up. Welcome to the other side! :-))
heh. i wish it were that simple.. if we’re into labels, ‘growing up’ is a label one could attach to every new second that one lives.. so i wont even begin to count the sides i could be on… 🙂
You got this feeling after 5-6 years. Man some dedication.. I started getting this feeling one year down the line and went on a “hiatus” from blogging. I was restricting myself in a way. Now my blog lacks focus and some posts feel half baked feeling. But what the hell… I can rant there without worrying about anyone asking me what the hell are you talking about, and that’s what matters to me, as of now. No idea why, but I am not comfortable doing the same on twitter. Weird no? I was a little surprised when you ditched brants for manuprasad. But I figured you were following the latest personal brand thing.
I wanted to do the same when I bought a new domain but I really liked the name chupchap + balu.com/.in wasn’t available =(
So from next week you are gonna be pretty much chupchap heh?
heh.. that’s the point.. it used to be fun, until it was dedication 🙂
and yes, you got the ” i cant rant” part absolutely right, at some point, the blog develops a character!!
i’ll still be posting, down to 1 instead of 2, that’s all 🙂
I could have written this post – generalised broad gist of what you are saying, not that I can ever write so eloquently.
I believe a blog goes through a full cycle. We start with writing for ourselves go through hoops and stages of various levels of anonymity, growth and such and then ultimately end with doing what best works for us. If writing for ourselves is what we started with, we will eventually try to find the peace and happiness that it brought us. 🙂 That’s what am doing at least.. the community, it’s fading away quickly.
..and hey, who u calling old?! It’s just prioritizing,a nd where you want your valuable time spent! 🙂
you write even better!!! 🙂
i think you’re right about the stages.. in my case, the community has been changing all the while, but there are a few from the old days of rediffblogs, absolut virtual buddies!! 🙂
yes yes, lets not get into the age thing :]
The bottom of my stomach dropped out as I started to read your post. But I get that we come to points in our lives when we just want to make a change. Thank you for being around when i decided to start my blog.. and thanks for sharing so much with the blogsphere. Even though we’ve never met, I feel like I kinda know you. Hopefully we’ll continue to see occassional updates on your blog, and the world won’t go horribly off kilter. Take care and best of luck. Eve
hold on!! dont go away!! I’ll still update, only the frequency will be reduced 🙂
and trust me, I AM glad to be around for the regular dose of music!! 🙂
I feel, the virtual life that we lead on blogs/twitter et al is nothing but a reflection of our real life. Even in real life we maintain a persona – at work, with acquaintances, sometimes even with friends and family. There are very few people with whom you can be your true self without thinking whether the person is judging you or not, otherwise it is mostly who you want to be rather than who you are.
Even I’ve stopped writing many things on my blog because now I know many people read what I scribble, and I am not comfortable with writing anything personal 🙂
thats a very subjective thing… it need not be a reflection of life at all…
real life personas are created less out of choice and more by some compulsion to conform/fit in… the online persona is a different compulsion – to express yourself as I may not in real life…but like i said, its converging 🙂
Hi, I think your blog has become less funny and more punny. IMO. I remember reading you a long time back when I was blogging, so I think there is a change. But it’s ok I suppose?
hmm, i think i know what you’re saying… once upon a time, i had the time and the patience (and the ability) to think up stuff, now i find that wordplay is much easier.. also, the ability to express an idea in 140 characters or an fb status is quite a post killer 🙂 so i choose different platforms for different expressions, i guess.
thanks for reading 🙂
It IS a generational thing I think, we were probabaly the early adoptors- the batch of 03-04 – when blogging, and for that matter, internet security was a fairly amorphous, unsure concept. I know I started it completely as a self indulgence – a more permanent form of diary you may say. Andover time, it has just created and morphed into what it is. Ultimately Mo, is right manu – you have to write for yourself.
Everyone changes.
Its fine. Not that you need my ok. 🙂
read all the comments one by one.
You must have noticed that I have been reading this regiularly. Though I visit your other pages, I am not a regular there as this is what I could relate to. It is great to be regular and post so frequently, but honestly, I did think how can people manage to blog so frequently in so many places? Maybe your other life needs you to be online.
Many people have faded just like that.
Talking about myself, I feel great that there are not many people who have crossed 5 yrs and above and who still continue to blog no matter how bad the content. 🙂 It takes guts you see to go on blogging when you know that your content is not that cool either. haha, I can post this in my blog.
:)…u expressed it so well…we do tend to become trapped in the persona we had created in our blogs…off late i have been feeling that iam playing to the gallery…earlier i wudnt have cared a rats arse…
didnt know that u have been here so long…in these short years i have been at it, i have already seen some just stop and go away…but iam glad u stayed…mainly becoz i get to find out the best eateries in blore…..