A Mommy Story

Several days ago, I was speaking with a friend who has recently started blogging. (I won’t get into the weirdness of having my internet life and local life crashing together yet again. Very odd.) Anyway, we were chatting about writing styles and such, and she said something that really took me by surprise:

“You’re different in person than you are on your blog.”

Hmmm…

So naturally, I’ve been dwelling on this for days. It’s not her fault – being giving feedback on myself tends to make me look inwards and evaluate the criticism. (Criticism here meaning an analysis, not necessarily something negative.) In other words, lots of navel gazing and living inside my head.

I know that neither the internet me or the everyday me provides the full picture of who I am. After all, in everyday life there are details of our personalities we hide from the public and other aspects we try to play up. But on the internet, parts of my inner self are kept private that might otherwise be common knowledge among friends I see in Columbus. For example, I feel comfortable sharing my depression with all of you, but it’s something I try to hide with people I talk with in everyday life. My relationship with Aaron is something I’d talk about casually with friends in-person – on this blog, however, many details are censored.

Do any of us ever show our true selves to anyone? I wonder if my online voice is closer to the real me than the person I am while walking through the grocery or chatting with friends at a party? Online I don’t have to feel self-conscious about my appearance. I have the luxury of taking time with my words, re-writing them if needed instead of dealing with a mouth that moves faster than the brain can put together complete thoughts. I have more control over what I will share and what I won’t share.

And now we come to the group participation part of this narcissism. I want your opinions: do you think your online persona is different from your “real-life” personality? If so, which do you think is closer to the person you consider the true you?

(Also, am I the only one who thinks crazy things like this?)