Homeschooling blogs abound, but what are the things we dare not tell about our homeschooling experience? Just like in anything else, there is a fine line between encouraging and discouraging our readers. We share our successes to encourage others and we end up discouraging those homeschooling moms who are already not very self-confident.
Sealed lips
We share our vulnerable moments to encourage homeschoolers and risk being ridiculed by moms who put their children in the public school every morning and never think twice about dropping their children off in a building for the next seven hours. “See, that’s why I don’t mess with homeschooling. Life’s too short to pour over algebra with my kids. Plus we need a second income to afford a vacation and nice clothes every year.”
Whatever you do with a homeschooling blog, there will always be the things you do not share. Let’s get the record straight. There are some things that are better left unsaid. It’s nobody’s business but your own. In this day of TMI (too much information) and oversharing through social media, it’s good to have a sanctuary of privacy for your family.
I believe privacy can be overrated as well, but there needs to be a circle of inner intimacy and privacy around your homeschooling experience. If nothing else, to protect the innocent in our lives.
As I thought about these things, I came across this poem from public domain. It deals with some issues of privacy due to prideful silence and it’s probably not 100% applicable to homeschooling blogs, but it’s a great poem and I thought I’d share it.
The Things We Dare Not Tell
by Henry Lawson
The fields are fair in autumn yet, and the sun’s still shining there,
But we bow our heads and we brood and fret, because of the masks we wear;
Or we nod and smile the social while, and we say we’re doing well,
But we break our hearts, oh, we break our hearts! for the things we must not tell.
We see but pride in a selfish breast, while a heart is breaking there;
Oh, the world would be such a kindly world if all men’s hearts lay bare!
We live and share the living lie, we are doing very well,
While they eat our hearts as the years go by, do the things we dare not tell.
We bow us down to a dusty shrine, or a temple in the East,
Or we stand and drink to the world-old creed, with the coffins at the feast;
We fight it down, and we live it down, or we bear it bravely well,
But the best men die of a broken heart for the things they cannot tell.
