I am going to try an experiment suggested by Gretchen Rubin in her book The Happiness Project, which I picked up for a good summer read last week. (Who wouldn’t want to read a book about happiness, right?) She talked about launching her blog, and that someone advised her that if she did so, she should write daily. Hmm… Something I certainly haven’t done here. But why not?

I say I don’t have time. (But I probably do.)

I am afraid I won’t have things to write about. (But I’m always thinking about something.)

I think you won’t want to read it. (But you’ve proven you will – thank you!)

I want it to be perfect. Perfectly expressed, polished, magazine-worthy article that will move your heart and your soul and change your life and get me lots of re-posts and “likes.” There, it’s out there.

I want it to be perfect because I want to be perfect, or at least for you to think I’m perfect. That’s the allure of the internet. I’ll only Instagram what I want you to see about my life – the happy smiles, the weddings enjoyed, the perfect-looking family moments of strawberry picking and visiting local restaurants and overall having a fabulous time in life. I tend to Facebook days when life’s going well. And when it’s not going well, and life is less than perfect, and I don’t have words to say and I feel like an awful mom and wife and friend, I hide. It’s easy to do in virtual reality, because there’s not usually people saying, “Hey! I haven’t seen you on Instagram lately. What’s your life been up to?” “No Facebook statuses lately, Heather – are you doing ok?” “No blogs in a month – everything going all right for you?”

This post said it well and got me thinking. Enjoy it. And I’ll (hopefully) be back tomorrow for another perhaps less-than-profound post.