Blogging for the Greater Good

When I originally started blogging I had just come to Calgary and was missing home. This was the best way to share my life and stay connected with everyone back in Toronto. Now, after a short sabbatical, I have finally returned to my creative outlet, my own version of The Truman Show. I’m reinvigorated and have returned with a renewed purpose. So why am I blogging?

I had my phase of online self-glorification. Or virtual peacocking, if you will. There was nothing like a brainless Facebook blog or status update to prop myself up in the virtual arena and to flaunt my attention-inducing powers to random wandering eyes of the Home Page feed. But I soon realized that I was just keeping up with the viral pace of an information-crazed society. Quality was giving way to quantity. Social media had instigated a flood of useless information that threatened to bury anything wholesome and good-intentioned beneath it. My blogs lay squished somewhere in that pile of useless crap.

Although selfish in its practice, blogging can be an exceptionally useful tool for good. It can inform, inspire and provoke. It can give others different perspectives in life, provide meaning to it, even change their course in it. It also allows humans to feel value by sharing something of value to society without personal gain. In a society that promotes consuming goods to feel happy, blogging can be a selfless act in a selfish world. The basic tenet of blogging is this - one’s experiences are shared not for his or her own glory, but ultimately for the benefit of others.

Enter me. I have returned to bring the internet back to its wholesome existence; to wield the power of blogging to slice and dice your philosophies and the ways that you approach life. This is not to say it’s my way or the highway. In fact, I welcome a friendly bout of intellectual fencing. Those with differing opinions have the same right to blog as I do.

This is also not to say that I am the next great prophet or celebrated philanthropist, here to turn the world on its head, like Nelson Mandela or Mother Teresa. The number of people who read my blogs will comprise but a tiny drop in the vast river of online bloggers and journalists. But as long as I make a positive difference in at least one of my reader’s lives I feel that my message has been spread and my mission accomplished.

(If you do feel that I made a positive impact, please pass my blog on to friends. Help fuel my propaganda machine! Umm, I mean, help me go viral and get famous! Ummm... what I really mean is spread the message of goodwill.)

The trait I ask of you readers is open-mindedness. I myself hope to be open-minded enough not to push my passionate (if not crazy) beliefs on you. Like a podcast on your favourite subject, or the evening news with your favourite news anchor and that hot weather lady, I simply ask that you tune in and listen. At that point you would have earned my gratitude. And if you’ve read up to this point you have earned my respect.

So come follow me on my wonderful blogging adventure that’s sure to provide curiosity, laughs, life changing catharses, and promises to take you on more twists and turns than the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. When the last word has been read hopefully I’ve left an everlasting impression, and a sugary craving for more blogs.

And if not, that’s okay too. Because it's not about me, it's about you.