Fear of conflict has ruled much of my life, a cage of my own making. What if I say what's on my mind and it hurts someone? What if I say what's on my mind and someone hurts me? Play it safe, take out any unpleasant feelings on myself, and try to swallow the pain.

It's not that I'm a people pleaser type, the kind who always has a smile, a positive thought outwardly. Nobody would mistake me for a happy person, or even for a person trying to act happy. It's mostly about invisibility. And because of all of this, I'm at best mysterious to most other people. I find quite regularly that people see me in many different ways than I feel inside.

One of the things I've realized in recent ponderings is that this is a place I've been honest, and where my insides are more on the outside. It took some kind of anonymity, perhaps, to "expose" myself - a veiled, indirect exposition. And I guess what I discovered is that some people like my insides out.

I have always had a few good friends with whom I could be honest, but that was usually after many months of subtly getting to know one another. But now I increasingly find myself willing to show people I meet my insides. It's still uncomfortable, and for whatever reason I'm much more comfortable sharing sadness and depression than anger or anything confrontational. But I'm slowly trying to work on the latter.

But this seems to be the fundamental learning of blogging - that sometimes you can connect quickly by being yourself. While I've been away, I've been trying to bring this world into the non-digital one, and even though I have not been faithful to the friendships that started here, your friendships have helped lead me on important paths towards life in the non-anonymous world.

I still get sick to my stomach if I feel I need to say or write anything even remotely bordering on conflict. So I've a long way to go. I don't ever want conflict to be easy and completely comfortable, but if I can remain compassionate through conflict, then perhaps I can become much more free than my spirit often feels itself to be.

Anyways, I'm verbose for two days straight.