Our Idealized Selves

My friends tell me that I’m much funnier in my blog than I am in real life. I wish I could disagree with them, but they’re kind of right. In real life, it’s usually the most obvious joke that pops to mind and unfortunately for those around me, I lack the impulse control not to say it. My cheesy sense of humor has become a thing of legend amongst my friends, who somehow still have the will to hang out with me.

On line though, I have control over what I say. As a writer I can fine tune what is said. Drinking a few beers before sitting down to the keyboard will yield even better results, though it makes typing a bit more challenging. I spend a lot of time editing and rewriting. I’ve probably taken five passes at this paragraph alone (so you can only imagine what my friends endure with “unfiltered DGB”). On line, I have the ability to be a slightly different version of myself.

These days, we live our lives on line. We blog. We tweet. We update our status. We present ourselves through words on a screen. But is the life we lead on line true? Or are we creating idealized versions of ourselves? My guess is that it’s the latter, which is why social media has become so prevalent. In these great big informational tubes, we project a carefully crafted image of ourselves for the world to see.

This being a parenting blog, logic dictates that the majority of us lurking about here have kids. If you think about it, having kids is similar to living on line. Stay with me on this. Kids, at least the young ones, idolize their parents. It doesn’t matter if the jokes are cheesy, or we burn the toast or we drop the ball during catch. Our kids, at least for a little while, see us as the idealized, perfect versions of ourselves. They think we are hilarious, great cooks and amazing athletes. They view us as the person we wish others would see.

Do you wear different personas in your life? If so, what are they and how are they different from your true self?

-DGB