A guy who sometimes reads my blog told me, “You must be really well-adjusted. You’re not like those other Christians.”

I wasn’t sure what this meant. I wanted to tell him that as much as I love writing inspirational things, I’m actually pretty crazy inside. Honestly — I’m often two loose bolts from falling apart at high speed.

I get the feeling many of us blog the same way we live: sort of preaching at others how we would like to be, vaguely implying our real selves through ambiguous glimpses, never fully letting on how neurotic and insecure we really are. So much of it is for show. We think if we can inspire others, we’re probably doing a good job at life and it shouldn’t matter how I feel if others can feel better. It’s living vicariously through others in reverse.

But that’s the point: We all secretly blog about how we would rather be. There’s an approximate ideal image we wear in public that loses its polish when you get up close. Some of that is hypocrisy maybe — but I sense that even in the striving, we are finding who we really are.

I don’t think I’m well-adjusted. But hopefully our blogs are not “preaching” anything we’re not already trying to do. Hopefully our blogs are more being than wanna-be. And I think we’re all sort of trying to get it right together. I wish we could be open about that in a way where we’re not glorifying the struggle to get pity and attention, but open enough to quit sounding like we know what we’re doing. We inspire each other when we’re real about the mess inside.

I’m still a rookie at all this. We all are, and it’s okay to be honest about that.

— J