psychology of blogging

*** this was written in 2008, posting again with cyber-accusations and criminal actions becoming more frequent.***

 

Whether Kancha Ilaiah is a fraud or whether saibaba is a god, whether there is brahmanical fanaticism or fanatic anti-brahmanism, there are enough blogs to argue both sides. All these bloggers can argue rather forcefully even if not sensibly. Why is blogging picking up?

Basically the operative element is an anonymous proximity. Even if my photo is seen you  cannot claim to become my friend and try to spend time with me. This safe “use and throw” relationship-of-convenience is the primary attraction of blogs. I can say what I want, and if you decide to register your protest I still have the right and the choice to allow the protest on my page. Those who see my page will be seeing my views and my counters (whenever, and if ever I can logically produce one) and no one will know where and when I am at a loss to explain.

I can still feel I am in a crowd that is talking about things which matter to me. I can protest with dignity or cheapness, be an angel or a devil, talk when I want to and be silent if that is fine for me. I cannot be forced into discussions; ofcourse, I cannot force you into a discussion, except when I dare to spit valueless venom through a personal pathology. These are the conveniences I have noticed and even used in blogs.

The second operative element in blogging is its pseudo-personal space wherein one can become disinhibited. Though your true skin will be seen by others when your blog is posted, you need not hesitate to say whatever you feel like unlike in the real world where you have to observe elementary decency to those who deserve it. Yet, it is only a disinhibited and not an uninhibited behaviour, because deep down you are conscious that your words are going to be seen by someone somewhere.

Masked identity is another courage-boosting element of blogging. You need not talk in your real name.  I know of some people who chose to mask their identity for real and valid reasons, but most of the persons who write in pseudonyms ( and sometimes in anonymity) do so out of fear. Though their words may appear courageous they still have not mustered enough conviction and courage to come out in the open and stand by what they have said.

Why mask identity? Some are like a compassionate medusa, for if their face is seen their critics would turn into stone, stupefied with fear. Some are like clowns who need to have a different identity to make an apparent fool of themselves so that others can have a good laugh. Some are like a silly child hiding behind a table thinking no one can see who and where they are. Whether one decides to disclose her/his identity or not is certainly a private decision that has to be respected and even if not accepted, not discussed.

The problem of wearing a mask is different in a socio-psychological perspective. There are intellectuals who use their intelligence to call themselves idiots, and so too are there idiots who stupidly call themselves intellectuals. Depending on why the mask is worn, and depending on the insightful intellect of the individual, a mask becomes a potent weapon or a poor joke.

It is understandable if masks are worn and identities deliberately disguised in the mushrooming social networking sites. Though these sites can be a forum for healthy and honourable matters, mostly they are used to find a `friend` to flirt. An elderly uncle who tries to wear shorts and T-shirts, ugly dyeing of hair and a false accent in which lies are expressed as values, will never be able to date a young girl with average intelligence. But in the virtual world, the same uncle just has to assume a name, age, occupation and marital status that would bring scraps to his page! But, blogs are not meant for picking up a date. Whether your profile declares you as young or old, spiritual or religious, left or right, no one `falls` for you. Only your views matter. And therefore your identity is never masked or invisible. However sublime your language, however innocent your discussion, your colours will show through the veil.

Blogging has its psychological benefits. Just as how your mind operates in a dramatic performance there are certain mechanisms operating here too. Initially there is identification, then there is the possibility of learning a conflict resolution and finally there is a catharsis. You identify with the character or the cause or the chronicle, you feel you have experienced a similar situation. Then you see the situational conflict resolved in the performance and if you choose to, you may try to use it to answer your personal question. Even if you cannot find a solution to your problem in the performance-narrative it would still be a cathartic relief. You can download feelings from your emotive memory and get the same relief of being happy, sad, angry or disgusted. But are blogs used for this?

Though blogs can be of immense personal psychological comfort, I see some bloggers using it to throw mud (if not spit venom) on ideas that are not consistent with their own values. Blogs are becoming pamphlets thrown on the disinterested by stander. If perchance someone reads and accepts their ideas it is fine, otherwise just some space on space is wasted! However impassionate and objective you may describe yourself, you will tend to lean towards one ideology versus another. If you have not formed your own opinions on matters, these moments would tilt you towards a particular idea if not ideology. The intelligent wearing the mask of an idiot would appeal to your conscience by their pseudo-innocence. You will fall for the game plan. Some vague emotional itch that you have been bearing all along would be scratched and you will not only become comfortable with that anonymous hand, you would start yearning for it.

If we can just be  a little more aware when we imagine that we are awake, we can escape from the dragnet. We would be able to retain our power to choose. We can choose only when we think. And, when we start thinking we cannot be silent. We would start protesting.

This is what had happened to me, and I consequently started  commenting on issues that I felt were concerning me, and the response I got from one blogger was that I have “become jobless”!! Blogging is not a jobless individual’s way of spending time, it is a social obligation to respond to the milieu.

Theatrics of Life

-curtain raiser.

In the beginning there is always a word, and the word multiplies and becomes a book.

To begin a book is needed. Later the book is shelved. It has to be. But, if the book is always around, opened every moment, referred and re-read instead of being remembered then either the book or the user is inadequate. The remembering has to happen with spontaneity; labour is most often love lost! Any reading should be a beginning to end reading. This series of articles is an introspective interaction at the end of which our roles as the writer and reader may change too.

As succinctly said by Shakespeare, “ all the world’s a stage, and all men and women merely players; they have their exits and entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts…”. Life indeed is drama. The scenes happen according to the script (not in the fatalistic escapist sense), but in the script of life, the artiste can improvise his role and thereby even change the course of the script. The performer can make the scene belong to himself just by focusing and relaxing. It is towards this enhancement of performance in life that we all strive till we exit.

Any performance needs light. As in any theatrical production, in life too there are spot lights and flood lights. The spot light is what Alan Watts called focused consciousness.

It is like this- there are times when your actions are deliberate and purposeful and this is in the spotlight of intense awareness. Many times we act in reflex, and this is in the floodlight of intuitive consciousness. In a spotlight the artiste needs to perform with precision, while in a floodlight he can move along with others and perform with ease and the comfort of company. Life is performing mundane, profane and even puritan acts on a daily basis.

Drama is ever present. In this wonderful theatre there is an ever-going interactive drama in which we assume, shed, resume, redefine, refuse, grudgingly comply and perform various roles at various moments in various places with carious persons.

We act, constantly. Acting is not mimicking or miming, not imitating, but responding and provoking, invoking, inviting, inciting, initiating and interacting – even through inaction. Onstage is the performance of daily living and off-stage is the performance in dream arena. In the theatre of life, to live well is to perform well. To perform well is to know the role, learn the role and be the role.

Though roles can shift in a miniscule of a second, they have to be performed to perfection to ensure smooth and successful progress in the drama of life. To know the role one has to feel the role. Stanislavsky, the theatre genius said, “when you encounter with a role, the first meeting like on that happens to lovers; the second meeting is like pregnancy and the third onwards, it is birth and rearing.” Though his description was to help artistes to conceive and develop their acting abilities, this can be relevantly construed to constructively create and enrich our repertoire of roles in life.

To learn a role one has to be aware of the encounter with the role. First impressions are the deciding factors in a role’s effective action and success, or defective display and failure. They are seeds with virginal freshness- unexpected, direct, unpremeditated, unprejudiced and unfiltered by criticism. A receptive frame of mind is essential to approach these roles. This receptive state of mind is an inner state of readiness and need, clarity and desire, composure and focusing.

The emotional encounter with a role that we watch or perform is the basic and most important aspect of creativity. When creativity is lost, charm vanishes; the performance is painful to the audience and the artiste. For, just as how a seasoned actor can take his role in a scene for granted, and because of repeated successful performances , we too presume about our roles in life, and often perform out of a rusted library that has outdated references. When such lackadaisical performances happen the results may not cause alarm or lead to failure, but the fire of life will be smothered, and performance in life become painstakingly boring. To be effective in a role is to remain sensitive and alert. It is about love.

Work is love, labour is pain. Life is loving- loving the self and the other. To love is the basic function of human machine, and the tools of emotion are intended for this functioning to be smooth. Love has to be experienced. It is an inner energy that needs the milieu to surface. Life is all about loving, yet, it is philosophised with so much pretentiousness that the simple and spontaneous act of breathing becomes a panting.

“ Thou to me the harp of gold,

I to thee the fingers bold “ –( Bharathi)

Was one of the greatest expressions of unison, greatest definition of creativity. The golden harp contains music yet needs the finger to emanate the notes. The finger knows the music yet needs the harp to produce the notes. Here production is not procreation but creation; it is not about productivity, but about creativity. It is not about interdependence but about inner interaction unaware of the action. This is the golden rule in performing the lover’s role. A lover in her/his role becomes the role and cannot be outside and objective. It has to be inside pouring out of every pore. It is an action, it is a performance, but it cannot be taught or premeditated. It has to happen. Top make this happening happen, one has to learn about other roles and others’ roles in life.

Learning and loving happen spontaneously in infancy, and then the teachers squash the musical babble and cook the human cookie. It tastes good to itself the first time. Confidence becomes a trifle overconfidence, and soon noise replaces notes and pretends to be music. Pretensions are ofcourse a natural process of learning. But with the passing of each test, poor imitations delude themselves as original naturalness.

The first lesson is always imitation. Unknowingly a model is selected to mould one’s role. The safest model is the least risky. It is one that is comforting and rewarding. To please to be pleased is the first concept understood at this point. As in any development, this has to be experienced and outgrown. To grow out of a developmental stage and to move onto the next phase, one has to identify, understand and resolve conflicts.

Any conflict is a difficulty of expression – to take in or give out the right response, meaningfully and in time. To express is to understand and make the other understand. It is the effort of the animal to become human, and the human to become the universe.

To express is to emote- appropriately and adequately.

The primal list of emotions, as defined in ancient Tamil and Sanskrit texts of India, are-

Love, Humour, Empathic sympathy of pathos, Anger to the explosive ultimate, Heroism of truth and valour, Fear, Disgust and the Wonder at the magic of mystery.

Love, joy, sorrow, fury, enthusiasm, terror, disgust and astonishment….these are the primary emotions. Life is painted from the palette of these emotions. These eight emotions interact with each other to present as drama in life. The beauty of classification of these emotions in Indian Texts (Natya Sastra in Sanskrit and Tholkappiam in Tamil), is intensely wonderful by the fact that after enlisting the eight primary emotions comes the description about the ninth state of mind, santhi – blissful peace and peaceful bliss. The idea is that all these emotions have to be understood and brought under one’s will in order to enable the mind to experience blissful peace and to continue life in peaceful peace.

All the plots of life’s theatre are scripted with and around these emotions neutral in gender, common to all, emotions are controlled by socio-economic and health factors. Controlled and even concealed they may be, but never prevented from appearing on the mindscape. This is the reason why an Indian uneducated villager can understand the smile, tear, frown or fear on the face of a Harvard topper. Emotions are instinctively acknowledged in the mind; but when expressions of emotions are to be adequately tuned to the frequency of social comfort, they have to be understood. Life’s drama always starts with a shriek and a cry from the mother and the baby; the smile and joy follow later. Perhaps the initial encounter with emotional roles may cause a painful moment of truth, but they would make life easier, to be continued!