20 Blogging Confessions From Beyond

This morning, Joe’s Box posted an interesting list of his “bloggers’ confessions” and invited others to follow suit. After spending the whole day brainstorming and reading Farrah’s take on it, here are several of mine.

June 2012: I edit my master’s thesis on the train from Maastricht to Den Haag (The Hague)

1. Writing is the only activity I have been doing for as long as I remember. When the internet gave people a space to express their thoughts, I instantly jumped on the bandwagon. I can recall posting my poetry online as early as 2005- and from then on, I’ve progressed onto other forms of writing and writing online.
2. Beyond Beirut initially started as my way of documenting  my experiences as a graduate student in the Netherlands. It breaks my heart, though, that I didn’t write as much about it, or didn’t write about events as they happened, as I should have. I feel like I lost an important record of the most fundamental and life changing experience I had gone through.
3. The name Beyond Beirut is  a remnant of those old days but is not at all reflective of my current content- I regret that I can’t change it now.
4. Not writing enough about the Netherlands was the main basis for my daily writing challenge last year.
5. When I read older entries about the wedding, the move, or my relationship with Ahmad, I am glad that I put in the effort. These posts make me realize that I have come a long way in such a short time.
6. After a year of writing about my wedding, I am now averse to the word. I even play a game as I write, where I challenge myself to go the longest possible in a piece without mentioning the W word. If it comes up when it doesn’t belong or too early, I will restart the writing process.
7. I am not proud of every single post I wrote. Some were written while I was half-asleep, or commuting back home, or while at the gym. Let me call this my hard-learned lesson in quality over quantity. 
8. This blog has taught me to be more aware of my surroundings and a better listener.
9. I have an unpublished post entitled “TOPIC LIST” in my draft box. Whenever I think of something, I jot it down there.
10. Hitting publish accidentally is a huge fear of mine.
11. Sometimes I find myself using easier words and expressions for the sake of the readers. I know that I can do much better linguistically, but I don’t want to come of as pretentious or lose my voice just because I know my way around a dictionary.
12. The current state of the Lebanese blogging scene in making me very weary. I have always considered myself to be an outlier with my very personal content and longer posts- and this feeling only seems to be increasing as many others have become brands.
13. I’m always looking for ways to write about my own unique experiences. So you won’t find me writing about the latest happenings in the country, restaurant and film reviews, and controversial issues- unless they have directly affected me.
14. I don’t like writing about Lebanon.
15. Honestly, I wouldn’t have kept publishing had it not been for Ahmad’s support (and sometimes insistence).
16. He’s also my proofreader.
17. Speaking of support, I wish more people would interact, especially by leaving comments and starting a conversation. Nothing makes my day like a comment notification.
18. Since making friends post-college has been difficult, I would love for this blog to be a vector for meeting new people.
19. My “coming full circle” moment was when I was featured in Outlook, AUB’s student newspaper, as I had been a staff member during my own student years.
20. I still doubt myself and my writing abilities.

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