On his blog, NW Ohio Skeptics, Bruce has a great post today about our personal story lines.
Put another way, by reading this blog, you don't know me. You see glimpses of my thought processes. You are provided with the opportunity to walk with me down paths of my choosing. You get inklings of what I am about. However, despite the fact I am more open than many, none of you knows who I am.
If you passed me on the street, 99% of you wouldn't recognize me. I would be nothing more than a nondescript face in the crowd.
Of course, it's a two-way street. Not only do you not know me, I don't know you either!!
The confusion about thinking we know someone certainly is not the fault of the blogging platform. We watch actors on TV or in movies and we THINK we know them as individuals. We flock to concerts of our favorite performing artists and, because we dig their music, we ACT as if we know who they are. We pore through books written by our favorite authors and, because we've read every word they ever written, we BELIEVE we know the mind behind the words.
In truth, we really can never know a person completely. This is true even if we could climb inside their mind and see life through their eyes. How do I know this to be true? Simple. We don't even know ourselves!
At the end of the day, I think we put too much stock in the concept of knowing anyway. As we trip down the cobblestones of life, we quickly discover that, for everything we think we know, there are gazillions of things for which we have no clue. Knowledge and knowing have great limitations!
While none of you who reads this blog knows me, you have, however, experienced me and I have experienced many of you. It is the experiential aspects of life that makes life genuinely worth living.
This blog puts me in somewhat of a difficult place with family. They can come to here and read everything I have written. They assume , that once they have read my blog, they can then “know me”. They then feel they have the right to make judgments about me, about my spiritual or emotional state, or the things I believe. At best, this blog is a partial picture of who and what I am. Readers only see what I let them see...He underscores a point that we often forget -- a blog is not the person who writes it!
Put another way, by reading this blog, you don't know me. You see glimpses of my thought processes. You are provided with the opportunity to walk with me down paths of my choosing. You get inklings of what I am about. However, despite the fact I am more open than many, none of you knows who I am.
If you passed me on the street, 99% of you wouldn't recognize me. I would be nothing more than a nondescript face in the crowd.
Of course, it's a two-way street. Not only do you not know me, I don't know you either!!
The confusion about thinking we know someone certainly is not the fault of the blogging platform. We watch actors on TV or in movies and we THINK we know them as individuals. We flock to concerts of our favorite performing artists and, because we dig their music, we ACT as if we know who they are. We pore through books written by our favorite authors and, because we've read every word they ever written, we BELIEVE we know the mind behind the words.
In truth, we really can never know a person completely. This is true even if we could climb inside their mind and see life through their eyes. How do I know this to be true? Simple. We don't even know ourselves!
At the end of the day, I think we put too much stock in the concept of knowing anyway. As we trip down the cobblestones of life, we quickly discover that, for everything we think we know, there are gazillions of things for which we have no clue. Knowledge and knowing have great limitations!
While none of you who reads this blog knows me, you have, however, experienced me and I have experienced many of you. It is the experiential aspects of life that makes life genuinely worth living.
Blogging allows me to interact with people (like you for example) that I never would have had the opportunity to interact with in pre-blog days.
ReplyDeleteI have been married 32 years. There are things about myself I have not told my wife. She knows me better than any person, so if she doesn't know everything about me.......blog readers sure don't.
On Facebook a man said he could tell the difference between a real Christian and a false one. I told him I didn't believe he had any such gift. I told him my family and I could dress up and come to his Church and I could then preach at his Church and everyone would think that we were a wonderful Christian family. We look the part.
And we are a wonderful family....just not the Christian part. :)
I appreciate getting to know the parts of their lives that people let me know. My life is far richer because of my blog and the other blogs I read and comment on.
Bruce