20220612 : pressure...

When I started to write, it was very new to me and was via WhatsApp to a handful of very close people. It was more a compulsion - that was the only way I could convey what was going on in my mind. It was a very small group on WhatsApp.

After a while, I got some courage and included a few more people. Still on WhatsApp. I had to create a broadcast list for that. This, while it was to share my random thoughts and share what I was going through and thinking, was mainly to generate conversations. I badly needed them.

Encouraged by many of the folk, I put it up on a blog. I don't know why I did it, it was a painfully long job for me. I think I did it mainly to prove to myself that I can do it. No bells or whistles - just a very simple one. I knew nobody was seeing it because it gives stats, but for some reason kept it updated. It was just there. Nobody really visited it.

Recently, I decided to post it on social media. Simply because I wanted to get a better readership reach on one particular message/ post.

That got a bunch of responses. from folks I wouldn't have thought about and imagined.

I certainly was not looking for it but got tickled by it.

I started posting on social media as well whenever I wrote something and updated the blog - and the comments and reactions have continued.

I realised at this stage, it is building up a pressure. A self imposed pressure. Whether it is worthwhile or not, the knowledge that it will get read is building up a pressure on my mind. 

2 kinds of pressure.

1. To be conciousness of what I write. I don't have inhibitions on what I am sharing, but the free feeling with a small group is replaced by thoughts of needing to be "politically right". I try not to get influenced by it, but it certainly is there.

2. This one is even more subtle. It's simply a self imposed pressure to just write. The fact that folks are reading and might respond builds a indescribable want to write and share and get responses. I am sure it is the same thing triggered in the head with all kinds of posts on social media. I can't find another word other than addiction.

It must be a lot more intense for periodic writers - like once a week or once a month so on. There must be so much pressure to write about something - anything in that timeframe.

I hope I don't cave in to that self imposed pressure and stay honest to myself. Write what I think about and share it, instead of thinking of something just so that I can write...