On being a cynic

I am a newbie in blogging, both in writing and maintaining my own blog as well as surfing what's out there. I am enjoying the experience so far. I have visited quite a few blogs and found some excellent writers and I make a point of leaving a comment behind whenever I can. Most of my comments are positive of course. But the other day I read something which bothered me enough to break that trend, and I left a negative comment for the first time even though the writing is actually pretty good.

I am still very new at this but I am finding that writing is a great way to figure something out. I thought about this negative comment quite a bit since, because I didn't like doing it at all, but having done it made me realize something: I really dislike cynicism.

This was not always the case, I was told for many years that I am a sarcastic and caustic person, and my sense of humor was very much derived from that source. It is such an easy thing to play cool and to self promote through cynicism. But not anymore. Today I actually find it disgusting and I do not miss that part of myself one bit, even when I lost my sense of humor along the way.

This idea is not original I suppose, and I didn't figure it out on my own either. About six months ago I was listening to my favorite podcast and this woman I really admire said something like "Cynicism is so boring." That was an Eureka moment! Maybe this is obvious to everyone, but it wasn't to me. It never occurred to me to link the two, but the idea slowly grew in my head. Yeah, damn it, it is boring! Cynicism is never creative really, kinda like evil. People use it to divert personality responsibility, mask their sense of insecurity, and to deny the chance of real discussion and progress.

So am I successful in dropping cynicism out of my life? it is very hard to say. I am definitely trying, but I am well aware that I am not so witty and light hearted anymore. Perhaps the road out the land of the selfish and the bitter must be a serious one. I would love to find a way to be humorous without being negative...but I fear it may be a study of many years, decades even. I suspect it would be a worthy goal.

Jackie