Why I have a blog...

“It is better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.” 

  Cyril Connolly

I know many of you don’t know the reasons why I started this blog or simply may not know me at all so here is a little insight. It originally was a school assignment and each week we had to create a new posting on it. What I didn’t realize was how self-motivating and helpful it would be to have a blog. I chose to continue posting in my blog as a way to help keep myself and my mind motivated & encouraged. I also chose to speak out about my passions for mental illness and domestic violence awareness. The stigma behind both needs to come to an end and I’ve chosen to speak out about them. I wanted to also create a safe place where people knew how I was feeling and didn't judge me for it; and that as a community we could share our struggles and successes, and hopefully inspire each other to be better. I have spent too much of my life being concerned about pleasing everyone, and not being true to who I was or how I was feeling. This blog gives me the freedom to please myself, remain true to who I am, and share how I feel.

My blog started out slow with the amount of views it was getting but I never let that discourage me, because I could go without a single view and still keep posting in it because I enjoy it. After just a few months though, I am now getting anywhere from 500-1,500 views a day. Some may be stopping by only because of a picture they found via google but that doesn’t matter. Perhaps that one picture brought to life what they were feeling that day or put their thoughts into the words they could not find. You often hear quoted: “"Pictures speak louder than words" or "A picture paints a thousand words" and I firmly believe that and why I post so many of them. Sometimes I am happy, sometimes I am mad, hurt, depressed, and sometimes I feel inspirational or post links and quotes that inspire me and in which I hope in turn will inspire those of you who take the time to check out my blog. I'm human just like everyone else so there are days where I post something not because I'm happy but because I'm having a rough day. So if you expect to come to this blog and always see uplifting stuff that may not be the case. It's my life story at the moment, my personal thoughts and feelings about something made public. I don't claim to live the perfect life and I don't think anybody should. Be brave enough to allow yourself to be you and realize you are just like everybody else: we have good days and bad days! Life is one big roller coaster and nobody should every feel forced to act like they don't get scared along the way or simply don't like parts of the ride at times!

So because of all this, what I love most is to post pictures that jump out at me, quotes that hit home or make me think, stories I’ve read or emails I’ve gotten, really just about anything that I personally feel compelled to post….because well it is my personal blog right?!!  As much as I love seeing the number of visitors go up I still need to remind myself that I do this page for me. I know that this sounds really selfish but it’s true and the reason why, that no matter what, I need to be true to who I am, continue to do what I have been doing and post what I want, things that mean something to me. But mostly I need to be true to myself, to how I feel, even if some of you want to post anonymous comments calling me “bipolar”, “skitzo”, “scum”, “so-called artist” and others words I refuse to post on here! Your attempts at belittling me and making my blog out to be a  joke will never bother me or stop me from posting what I feel like posting! I refuse to be someone that I am not, just to please the crowds or the silence any haters that come this way. I want to be real even IF that is considered to some to be “bipolar”, “skitzo”, “scum”, or a “so-called artist". I don't force anybody to come to by blog and read my posts so if you do not like my blog or me personally, then do yourself a favor and stay off of it. Comments that are degrading will never be posted so it’s up to you if you want to continue to waste your time posting them.

I hope all of this makes sense. By me saying that this blog is mine DOES NOT MEAN that it's not for those of you that enjoy reading it too. It just means that I'm going to post what I want. I'm not trying to please everyone, because that is just impossible. But please also know this blog is for all of you too. Please leave comments (which are moderated now), share what you would like, use the blog as much as you would like, if you need somebody to talk to feel free to reach out to me, I'd be honored for you to do it here and honored if you chose to follow my blog. Thanks so much to those of you who have allowed me to be me, and letting me write for me. In turn for letting me be who I am, I hope that you are TRULY getting something back from this blog and will continue to visit it. ~Krista