::inspiring Monday::

I went to a fantastic talk today by Thomas L. Friedman, the three-time Pulitzer-prize winner and New York Times columnist who seems to win a prize for pretty much everything he writes. He's an amazing speaker and his talk was, above all, a lesson in communication! One thing in particular stayed with me – a column is meant to provoke.

The moment he said it, I felt like grabbing a pen (or my laptop, let's be practical) and writing away. I'm not controversial nor particularly thought-provoking with my writing, but that one sentence inspired me to get those thoughts out through my fingers and that's a feeling that must not be wasted! I thought back to my favourite columnists – all Portuguese, a clear gap in my British education which must be addressed asap! – trying to recall if they were, indeed, provoking. And they are. They're funny and inspiring and enlightening; sometimes they're trivial, other times they make me feel like we'll change the world together. 

Outside the realm of this blog, I am a passionate person, that doesn't shy away from a good debate, on any topic, from politics to football to science. I tend to have strong opinions on the subjects I know, and I enjoy learning from people I respect on things I have no clue about. I'm open, a bit too honest and quite straightforward.

Here though, it's a different story. The thing is, I'm not sure I want it to be that different anymore! But… 

There are reasons as to why the writing is tamer than real life. The main one is perhaps that I've been a nostalgic writer for most of my life; writing was a soul cleansing exercise for me up until quite recently. Secondly, there's always that thing at the back of my head going on and on about too much exposure to the whole wide world, because, really, you never know who's reading. And finally, what you out on the internet stays on the internet forever and that's bloody scary! I treasure growing and evolving and changing opinions and perspective on things; I feel that the public written word carries too much weight at times and you'll forever be pulled back to that one moment when you've written something you no longer defend. 

So that's where I'm at right now. Just so you know! A pretty great and inspired Monday, with plenty of thought-provoking things for me to mull over. And to think I'm considering to blog everyday for May on top of it… will I?