2.201: Reflections on a Thursday Post

In the intermingled world of personal expression and fame hunting the blog/vlog is king. My children have fallen prey to the meme-driven world of Youtubers trying to express themselves through daily posts. Two of the Talisleggers have formed their own channel. There is no talislegger channel, though the thought has crossed my mind. I let it die midstream, because my immediate thoughts went not to what I would say but how I would brand it. So that left me asking myself the question of why do I post?

The 10 minute rule is highly self reflective. It is catharsis and discipline and, well, an excuse to have to write. I only failed at this during one short period in the last 5 years. It forces me to be a constant writer, if only for 10 minutes at a time. This is my purpose. Now for a channel the purpose would be shameless self promotion–an ego-driven desire to be noticed and eventually compensated. This appears to be the purpose for most of these blogs. Even my boys are in it to get noticed, get likes and follows, and eventually sell merchandise for profit. This feels very much like the misguided push of a capitalist culture.

I think there is a value to finding profit in what you love. I also think that once you are driven or beholden to profit, it changes your relationship with what you are doing. I don’t want to do the rule for profit. There’s a place and space for recognition and this really isn’t it. Follow, if you like, but I don’t intend to shape this thing to grow followers.