More on BlogHer ‘10

12thAugust2010

While my last post focused on the feelings of inspiration I felt when I left NYC on Sunday, I’d like to mention a few specifics about my time at the conference and share a few photos.

For the third year in a row, my roommate was Liz Rizzo. She’s delightful, and she doesn’t seem to mind when I stick to her side for dear life when we attend parties together. She’ll walk right up to a stranger and say hello, while I find the idea quite unappealing. Thanks to Liz, I did meet a few lovely new people along the way. Here we are on Friday morning, waiting for the welcome session to begin.

Liz and Zandria

For the second year in a row, Siel (”Green L.A. Girl”) accompanied me as my guest to a Nintendo dinner. (Disclosure: I am a Nintendo Brand Enthusiast.) This year the dinner was held at the Loeb Boathouse in Central Park, and they picked us up from our hotel in pedicabs. Not only that, all of the pedicab drivers were dressed up as Mario. It was very entertaining and we got quite a few stares on our journey.

Mario!

On Saturday morning, I was invited to attend the PepsiCo Sofa Summit. There were about 30 attendees, and it was described as a “provocative, interactive discussion about the ideas, influence and impact that women yield today and potential for tomorrow.” The moderator of the discussion was Campbell Brown.

There’s a 2-minute highlight/recap video on YouTube, with close-ups of me on camera at the 11-second and 53-second markers.

Saturday night, I went out with a group of ladies to dinner at Vatan (including Suzanne, who lives in the city and made the recommendation), which is an Indian vegetarian restaurant. It was incredibly good. Four of us took the subway home. The picture below is of me and Maren. (I look tired after the long day, but check out my mini-bicep as I clutch the subway pole. Yay for strength!)

Zandria and Maren

I’m leaving out a lot of people I saw and things I did, but those are a few highlights. Next year the conference will be held in San Diego. I checked my Flickr account just now and realized that my first (and last) visit to San Diego was 7 years ago this month. Will I take the opportunity to go there a second time…?

Posted at 11:49 am in BlogHer10 | Comments (5)

I Want to be Powerful (A BlogHer ‘10 Recap)

10thAugust2010

Last week, I spent three days in New York City for BlogHer ‘10. It was my fourth time attending the conference. (I went to Chicago in ‘07, San Francisco in ‘08, and back to Chicago in ‘09.)

I registered for the conference last year, so even though I’ve hardly blogged at all in the past six months (and to be honest, for six months previous to that I was only blogging 1-2 times a week), I never considered not attending.

I like going to BlogHer because I always leave feeling inspired. Not just inspired to write (although that’s part of it, because I’m writing right now), but because of the attendees and speakers. There are ladies out there in the world doing some really cool things, and never do I see as many of them gathered in one place as I do at the BlogHer conferences.

Women at BlogHer are speaking out, starting their own businesses, finding their dream jobs, creating and fulfilling their Life Lists, taking awe-inspiring photographs, and inspiring other people through their writing.

Some of the attendees are ordinary, and not quite as ambitious, but a number of those ordinary ladies — I include myself in that group — get a glimpse of all the stuff they could be doing and it makes us dream of doing more. (My friend Sassymonkey attended the conference as well, and she wrote a very cool post about how she wants to Do More.)

My goal has always been to inspire people through my writing. I’ve gotten away from that goal in the past year, but I feel like I might be inching my way back.

Wanting to inspire people doesn’t mean I want you to do the same things I do. Let’s face it — even though I like my life, I could be doing much cooler things than what I’m currently doing. I’m working on a Life List but I haven’t been brave enough to publish it. If it’s published, that means I’m ready for people to hold me accountable to it.

But I’ve been thinking I should get my Life List out of draft form and publish it already. I want to start working through it. I want it to inspire me. I want to be a better, smarter, more adventurous person.

Through my actions and writing I want to inspire other people, just like some of those women at BlogHer inspired me last week.

After the conference, BlogHer Community Manager Denise Tanton said that we are more powerful than we think. Here’s a snippet:

You. Are. Powerful.

But many of you don’t know it — or don’t recognize it — or don’t own your power.

I cannot count how many times I heard one of you brush off a compliment, earnestly given. I cannot tell you how many times I heard a woman, shyly and almost apologetically, talk about what she writes about. I cannot count how many times I saw talented writers uncomfortable when another woman praised her blog. I cannot count how many times I saw women uncomfortable with their own success.

At one point when I was at the conference, someone complimented me on something — I honestly don’t remember what it was, but I think it was something I was wearing — and I downplayed it. Afterward I thought to myself, “You should have just said THANK YOU.” It’s what I normally do. It’s what I strive to do. If someone gives you a compliment, take it.

However, I am guilty of not thinking that I’m powerful. Don’t get me wrong: I have pretty good self esteem and I’m proud of my independence. But would I call myself powerful? I’ve never used that word to describe myself before, but I’d really like to change that. To me, power is a feeling I’ll have within myself, not a goal to control or have influence over other people.

I want to feel comfortable saying that I’m powerful.

Posted at 8:38 pm in BlogHer10 | Comments (6)

My Sis and Me

3rdAugust2010

Taken at a baby shower we attended last weekend. I love her muchly.

Me and Elissa

Posted at 5:03 pm in Family | Comments (1)

A Farewell of Sorts

13thJune2010

I haven’t written a post for BlogHer in over three months.

A few days ago, I made it official — I wrote a farewell email that was sent to all of my fellow BlogHer writers. One of the responses I received almost made me change my mind. She said: “You’re irreplaceable. There is a huge hole in the Love and Sex category and nothing will ever fill it like you did…Your posts were my favorite. When I got a divorce and started to get back in the game, it was you I looked to. I’m going to miss your voice and adventures.”

I don’t know what to say to that. I haven’t been able to write her back yet — whenever I think about doing so, I feel like I’m going to cry. It’s humbling when you realize your writing has made an impact on somebody else’s life.

But even with that knowledge, and as much as that woman’s words (and similiar words from other people) mean to me, I know this is the right decision. Like other big decisions I’ve made in my life, I took some time to make sure this is what I really wanted to do and then I acted on it.

I can’t continue to write just because other people want me to. I did that for months, and it got to the point where writing wasn’t enjoyable anymore. I felt like I was searching for something…anything…to write about. I was writing because I felt like I had to — because I had a deadline and an obligation — and nobody wants that to be the reason they write.

The funny thing is, I used to enjoy sharing details about my life. For years, it was normal for me to write a post at least every few days. About a year ago something changed — I continued to write my weekly posts for BlogHer, but any other posts on my personal blog became pretty much nonexistent. There wasn’t one overwhelming reason for that, but I have a few hypotheses.

For one thing, I feel like I’ve become more private in my slightly-older years. There have certainly been times in the past when I wanted to limit certain people from accessing my blog. (For instance, there was that time years ago when my then-boyfriend’s ex-wife was reading my blog and used certain things I said for ammunition against him.) And in the past few years that I’ve been online dating, there’s been more than one instance where a guy Googled me and found my blog before we’d even met in person. I’ve never been ashamed of my writing, but I didn’t necessarily like that a guy could know so much more about me than I knew about him. However, I continued to write even after those examples so they weren’t the sole reason for this decision.

Another reason I stopped writing for BlogHer is because I’ve been writing about being a single 20-something for over three years. I started when I was 26 and last week I turned 30. For years, when people asked me what I write about for BlogHer, I told them “I write about being a 20-something single woman.” And truthfully? I was opposed to changing that line to “I write about being a 30-something single woman.” When my 30th birthday rolled around, it seemed like a good time to make a change.

But that wasn’t the sole reason, either. I didn’t stop writing for BlogHer just because I’m newly-30 and single. (For God’s sake, I’ve always said that I’d rather be happy and single — both of which I am right now — than unhappy and coupled. That will always remain the case.) The lovely people at BlogHer said they wanted me to stick around and that I was welcome to write about an entirely new topic if I preferred.

I said no. I just can’t do it right now.

The reason I stopped writing for BlogHer is this: I did a lot of stuff in my 20s and I have a feeling my 30s are going to be just as full, if not more so. I want to keep myself open for new adventures and opportunities, and part of that process has involved making changes to things that marked my 20s. For instance, in the past few months leading up to my birthday I moved back into an apartment by myself, cut my hair shorter than I’ve had it in many years, and went off to Europe for two weeks. As it turns out, I needed to include the BlogHer gig in that list, too.

My personal blog has been a lot of things for me over the past eight years. It’s been a public diary. A place for friends and family to keep up with my life even though I don’t see or talk to them every day. A place for me to meet new people, some of which have become irreplaceable real-life friends. A place for me to let the world (at least those who take the time to read my words) know what’s going on in my head.

My personal blog will remain public for the time being, and I will continue (at least for right now, I’m planning to continue) to update it once in a while. I’ve even been told that I’m still welcome to write for BlogHer in the future if I feel like it.

Over the years, people have asked me when I thought I might stop blogging. I’ve asked myself that same question, but it was impossible to know the answer. After taking this step, I must admit, I feel like I’m a little closer.

Why do I feel differently about blogging in my 30s than I did about blogging in my 20s? I don’t know, but I intend to explore the answer to that question.

Posted at 5:22 pm in BlogHer | Comments (7)