'The World opened to me when I learned to read' - Mary Mcleod Bethune

Writing blog posts in response to prompts is a common practice in the blogging community. Prompts help channelize creativity in a direction the blogger might not have thought of. Ever since I started my blogging journey, I have been writing posts whenever a prompt attracted me. Indiblogger and Blogadda have been great tools in this regard. Weekly prompts have helped bring a regularity to blogging, not just for me, but for many others as well. It was a surprise this time when the current prompt on Indiblogger did not get many entries. I wondered. When I was looking at the prompt suggestions last week, my 'blogger' sense had told me that many people would vote for the 'blog review' in the hope that they would be featured by some other fellow blogger. It was a bigger surprise however when the prompt was selected but hardly got any response.

I had personally refrained from voting for the prompt for two reasons. One, I knew I was going to be busy on the weekend and would not be able to write on it. Two, I thought that writing a blog review is a difficult task and would require lot of time and focus on the specific blog I would pick. Then, when the responses came, one from Sir Tomichan himself, who had suggested the prompt, I wondered if others too had felt what I felt and yet had voted under the spell of what Sir Tomichan correctly points out, "subconscious longing for adulation from others". (Read the post here if you haven't already.)

As writers, we expect our posts to be read. We hope to be praised. We also wish that we are liked. But writing is a skill that affects different people differently. Some might have a natural liking for poetry, and others might hate it. Some might drool over a satirical or a humorous post and others might fail to understand it. In keeping with the taste of the reader, a writing gets appreciated or disregarded. And this makes reviewing a complex task. A reader may love one post of the blogger and dislike some other post by the same blogger. Sometimes, the way a post is structured, or the layout of a blog might evoke certain likes or dislikes. For all these reasons, I felt that I cannot review a blog. 

Having said that I have certainly appreciated and learned a lot from the blogging fraternity. There are some really really good bloggers who have inspired and added value to my life. They have made me think. They have made me interrogate myself. They have also made me google up a lot of stuff I was unaware of. Then, there are some who by the magic of their camera have captured a world that I have not been to. Those images have sometimes given wings to my imagination. And lately, there have been some sensitive minds whose acute observations in their fictive and non-fictive posts have brought out the glaring harshness of the present day terrors. 

I am going to share link here of some of the posts that have touched me deeply. These posts will give you a peek in their writer's mind. It might not be a defining post of the blogger's style and skill but it is something with which I have been able to connect deeply. It is something that has made me revere the writer and made me wish I had a mind like theirs, a skill like them.

#UnitedWeStand by Saru Singhal (Read all her HashTag Stories. She excels in it, seriously. Food for thought in a few words.)

Śāntam {peace} – Navras 9 by Shweta Dave (Read all her posts on Navras.)

बूँदें : RainDrops by Kokila Gupta (Read all her Hindi poems....They are delightful like a child and they always make me love life.She had been absent for sometime but has made a comeback. I wish her lots of luck.)

Merciless Beauty by Sir Tomichan Matheikal (It is very difficult to pick one from Sir Tomichan. Read as much of him as you can.)

Camouflage by Archana Kapoor (Read all her Haiku-poems. She is an expert on this.)

The Smartphone Revolution by Alok Singhal (Laugh your way through the post. Read some of his personal posts and travelogues too.)

Micro-tales by Maniparna Sengupta Majumdar (It is difficult to pinpoint one style of writing that she excels at for the simple reason that she excels in everything she writes!)

Treasure of Nature by Purba Chakraborty (A poetess - What more should I say!)

Wordless Wednesdays by Indrani Ghose (I am getting addicted to these posts which feature a picture and caption responses by her readers. Her travel articles are good too.)

पसंदिदा तीन शब्द by Jyoti Dehliwal (Very well written posts in Hindi. Do read to get a sense of the writer's sensitivity.)

#Haiku इंतज़ार by Manisha Sharma (Short poems in Hindi. Thought-provoking, they touch your heart.)

सिलसिला by Amit Agarwal (Like Manisha, he too writes short poetry in Hindi. It is sure to leave an impression behind.)

Lei - A Wreath for your Soul by Somali Chakrabarti (This is the title of her book. Her posts are well-written, informational, introspective and engrossing.)

Lighting up the Special Light by Sreedhar Sir (His posts speak from experience.)

Twinkling Eyes  by Joshi Daniel (His snapshots say it all!)

35 Best Sites For Free Images by Prasanna Dasari (I have started following this blog lately. Prasanna comes up with good information and interesting insights in his posts.)

This list is by no means exhaustive. I might have missed out on a lot of good writings. This is a purely subjective choice and as I said, it is not a review. 

Image Source here

I want to urge all the bloggers out there to share something that has added value to their lives. 

Written for IndiSpire Edition 94