Dance like no one is watching...

Writing a blog is very similar to 'dancing like no one is watching'. Its like waltzing to a favorite tune on a rainy afternoon when you are alone in your house with the curtains drawn, the windows shut and have solitude as your only audience. In that moment in time, there are no adjectives like good, bad, clumsy, masterful or loony. There is just pure delight at being able to express yourself - the awkwardness of that kick in the air doesn't count nor does the silliness of your self indulgence matter! Its about overcoming your self consciousness and fear of being judged to drop a few inhibitions and having some fun. The same holds for writing a blog. Who cares if someone wanders into this space on a random jaunt across the uncharted stretches of the web? What does it matter if no one ever does? All that matters is that there is music ringing in your ears that is making your feet tap.

The question that has plagued me for a while now is how one can speak with enough honesty to make the exercise worthwhile for one's own self while not giving 'too much away', how to express one's opinions candidly without worrying someone somewhere (especially someone that knows me in the 'real' world) might read these words and wonder about kind of person the author is. The opinion of strangers doesn't matter to me as much as it once used to but I can't honestly say that an ill-tossed random comment from someone I know always fails to make a dent in my oh-so-delicate-that-it-is shameful armor. Like that runaway Frisbee that catches you unawares in a park on a windy day, you are always guarding yourself from random missiles coming your way.

I don't like attention to my person except from people closest to me ....(who doesn't?). I am one of those people who freeze when they sense that they are being 'looked' at, are never comfortable 'standing-out' and would shy away from any situation which puts them under the direct gaze of a dozen pairs of eyes. Indeed I have come a long way from the time when I wore over sized clothes so that I could reinforce my exaggerated need for self-protection or sulked for days when judged. But I still work out in the privacy of my own living room, I prefer go to the swimming pool late in the evening when I can splash around all by myself and pretend that I can actually swim, write poetry to avoid confrontations with the stream of consciousness and stop dead in my tracks if someone looks at the computer screen from behind my back... all for the fear of being judged, for appearing to be lacking in some skill or ability that's relatively commonplace in the world. This self-censorship is crippling. For surely, 'the world' doesn't have the time to stop and pick me out for any form of criticism, its just me paralysing myself with an obsession for quality. Maybe its time to break free. Maybe its time for me to realise that in the process of keeping to myself, I am losing some great learning opportunities. More than that I am missing out on some solid, new age fun. So here I am, ready to invite Muse into my Blog spot and not allowing self-consciousness or self-censorship to cork my creative juices.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae7c6JCYKyY