I think, therefore I write

The veil that I need

I have been toying with the idea of anonymity just as AK has been for a while. However, I guess he is on a totally different plane than me changing the usernames now and then :P.

What I want is to blog under a pen name. I need this to let go of some of my inhibitions. You can call me shy or timid, but I know I am not that. Then why don’t you write whatever you want in this blog, you ask? I am a diplomatic person (Of course, being a Libra). For me things need to be in equilibrium. I don’t prefer controversies.

This blog was started way back and can be easily found by googling my name. Most of my friends, colleagues and family know I write here and this blog has been in my mail’s signature for a while now. Whether any of these people remember and visit is not my bother. I am a person who wants to tell her opinions but at the same time exert caution. It’s because I’m a bit wary of the internet and it’s antics. This might not seem reason good enough for you but it is for me. I accept that I need a veil to shout out my opinions through. Not always, sometimes.

Much like the veil women make out of shawls to protect their faces from the pollution. This analogy suits my situation well because when we cover our faces, our eyes- the source of truth will be visible. The truth in my writing will remain the same. The add-on will be a few things which I don’t write here due to some necessary inhibitions. [I don’t write if I can’t be honest and explicit. I won’t polish it off as something else just because I want to write about it but at the same time want to be hidden too] So let me plough on.

There are 3 hurdles for me and they are the reasons that I am toying with the idea for a while instead of going ahead with it.

1. This blog has been and is very dear to me and I feel that it should not be sidetracked when I start a new one. I think I can make this one work if I am focused.

2. I want a good name for the new blog and a nice URL to go with it. And I want that to be satisfactory for me so that I never feel I should change it. I don’t need any fancy ones but I need something that I feel is okay. Because with this blog, I changed the names and URLs many times until I settled down, much to the annoyance of my friends 😉 So still thinking of something that will suit my mind. This one too will work out if I put my mind to it.

The next is a head-breaker for me.

3. I want to keep my reader base whom I got to know by blogging. No, not for the popularity. I just don’t want to lose the opinion of some of the best people who I know via blogging. You guys are wonderful people, writers and critics that I want you to know about it. You have molded me into the writer I am and I am grateful for that. You guys know me by my writing ever since the beginning. That’s the way you will still know me under a pseudo name too. But if I do that, the purpose of anonymity is lost. I feel that’s a small compromise since I feel it’s okay for these people to know that its me out there under that pen name. So I am thinking of a way to let you guys know about my other blog if I do go through with this plan. Actually any suggestions on this will be helpful.

Thinking hard…. 🙂

Until later 🙂

9 Comments

  1. Guruprasad

    You lose control over anything you post or put up on the internet and almost always that can be traced back to you. Though you have posted here about writing anonymously with the intent of retaining your readers, anyone visiting this blog can get to know about the same and tracing your new pseudo-anonymous blog will be very easy and straightforward.

    If I were you and I wanted to go anonymous, I will keep both the identities separate and will try to gain readers (existing ones and new ones) by trying to participate in discussions under the pseudo-anonymous identity. If people are interested in finding more about you they will visit your new blog and if you write well and they like it, they will subscribe to it. Yeah, you might not get all your existing subscribers to your new blog, but I am sure you will get a lot of new people as well. Don’t expect to start something anonymous by starting to build on whatever you have and instead start from scratch and see how it goes. You will definitely love the challenge and the journey it takes you through.

  2. Keirthana

    Agreed! Makes sense… Let me think on it 🙂 This will give me 2 options: one to create an anonymous identity and take part in blogging discussions with that identity. The other to simply to just go and start writing a blog as I like under a pseudo name. We’ll discuss offline which will suit me better 😛

  3. Keirthana

    Also I didn’t mean to get all my existing subscribers to my anonymous blog but only the people who know me via my blog and not in person. That way their opinion will not be influenced by biased opinions already formed about me as in the cases of people who know me in person. 🙂

    Anyway, let me think it out.

  4. Ajay Kontham

    First of all, welcome to my state of mind. 😛

    And let me start off with a light note. It will be easy.

    But not quite. You know that.

    I have been there like a million times. Thats’ why I keep coming back to my original name. And also that my pseudo names are literally the dumbest names ever in the history of pseudo names.
    About the URL, I have like a million names and each one looks better than the other. And that makes it difficult to choose that that is cool and not too frenzy, and again it has to be simple but again eye-catching.

    Please divert the suggestions to me also. I too am in the same boat as K.

    • Keirthana

      True. I have been toying with this for a while and yet all I know now is I wanna write under a pseudo name. Frustrating innit? Guess we both didn’t know we would want this when we started the blog else we could have just gotten it done in the first attempt itself. Mind works in weird ways!

      I have a few names to kick start with and I realize that the 3rd pointer of reader base retention will not be fully solvable. So I think if I want to do it, I should just get going without worrying about anything else. As Guru above has said, just start writing in a new blog. Let whatever happens, happen. After all we are writing because we need to get that out.

  5. Raghavan alias Saravanan M

    Though the idea of starting a new blog is very welcome, why not be in your own name? Just for shouting out or opening up your heart does NOT really insist hiding the identity and wearing up an anonymity! It is my personal opinion 🙂

    Good luck!

    Cheers,
    Raghavan alias Saravanan M

    • Keirthana

      I accept na and I have done it in this blog so many times. But this blog has a few constraints. I cannot explicitly vent out my frustrations on various persons/situations just like that. I cannot write about strong topics without thinking twice. And I hate it when that happens. I want to write uninhibited. I know a lot of writers do that with real names but that’s just not me. Maybe I’m too soft or maybe I don’t have the guts. I am not getting into that right now.

      This itching feeling of wanting to write without thinking twice is there for so long. Yet I can’t let go. It’s maddening. A lot of people might not understand this but that’s how I feel. I might even change my mind once I go through it. Who knows? All I know now is I wanna try it out.

  6. PeeVeeâ„¢

    Though you seem to have sorted this out, lemme suggest one more thing. You can start a whole new blog with a whole new identity without anything there that connects back to you, including e-mail IDs and references and then send a mass mailer out to those readers who you want to continue hobnobbing with. That suits your purpose?

    • Keirthana

      Yeah, I have done exactly that except the mass mailer part. That part I am waiting for the right time to kick in since I want this to be perfect, just the way I want it. When the time comes, I will send the mail out.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *