Blogging about blogging about blogging

I have been known to be critical of people who put up a blog that spews forth all the mundane details of their inane lives. I mean, who cares? One of my friends pointed out that most people who have a blog actually have so little of interest to write about that they just write about writing in their blog, or writing about other people writing in their blog. I guess they think that it's delightfully meta, whereas it really seems to be more like some kind of mental masturbation.

But seriously, people have the right to put up a blog and write up whatever crap they feel like. Just as long as they don't expect the entire world to hang on their every word and give them kudos for having such a "deep poetic soul", or razor-sharp intellect, or whatever delusion of grandeur they happen to be suffering from.

So, I feel a little ashamed to have a blog. Of course my blog is different, what I write is going to be interesting, insightful and witty. Of course.

I don't think for a minute that what I write here is going to be of any interest to anyone. It's not very exciting, clever or incisive. Maybe some of my friends might think it is mildly interesting, but even they probably don't reckon it's worth the time it takes to read it.

Because the truth is, this blog is for me. According to the Myers-Briggs personality test, I am an INTJ personality type. One of the features of this personality type is 'extraverted thinking'. Basically, this means that in order to think through something properly, I have to get it out of my head somehow. Maybe there are other ways of 'extraverting', but for me, it basically means that talking something through with someone is my way of thinking something through.

Now, obviously, not everything I think requires a conversation in order to be elicited, but anything reasonably major does. I can sometimes substitute by carrying on a conversation with myself in my head, but it's not really a good substitute (never mind what implications that has for my mental state). However, writing is a reasonable substitute, but only when it's written for someone else. It seems that it's the act of framing my thoughts for someone else that helps me to see what they are.

To quote Carl Weick: How do I know what I think until I see what I say? I guess Weick must've been an INTJ too, or at least been an extraverted thinker.