Debts and stories

I meant to mention it earlier, but I pretty much loved this story by John Leland in last Sunday’s NYT: “Debtors Search for Discipline Via Blogs.” If you missed it, it’s worth checking out: It’s about people who have problems managing their finances, and in fact often have enormous debts, but who for whatever reason just can’t talk about it with their friends or family. They’ve found solace (and success in reducing their debts, apparently) by using the annonymous blog audience as a sort of confessional.

Like other debt bloggers, Tricia believes the exposure gives her the discipline to reduce her debt. “I think about this blog every time I’m in the store and something that I don’t need catches my eye,” she told readers last week. “Look what you all have done to me!”

For one thing, it’s bit of a thrill to read a story about blogs being deployed for something other than promotion, trashing some “mainstream” entity, or both.

For another, the story indicates that this seems to be helpful in dealing with what I think is an authentic problem for a lot of people. (Not an invented or trumped-up “problem” like “the need for personalization” or “the craving for authenticity.”) It’s a genuine new solution for an old dilemma. (A solution for some people, at least — I’m not suggesting that consumer debt is going to disappear tomorrow because of this.)

It somewhat reminds me of the work of James W. Pennebaker, who has studied the potential positive effects of writing/journaling for helping people deal with emotional/mental/physical crises and problems. I’m by no means an expert on his work, so I can’t really speak to it very directly, so I’ll just quote from this site of his: “Writing about emotional upheavals in our lives can improve physical and mental health. Although the scientific research surrounding the value of expressive writing is still in the early phases, there are some approaches to writing that have been found to be helpful.”

One of the things I have wondered about Pennebaker’s work is how important the idea of an audience is to the person who is using writing in this way. I assume even the person writing longhand in a notebook imagines an audience on some level. But is there an effect from writing online, where it’s so much easier to imagine, and possibly even obtain, an audience? Is that important to the process or not?

All of that strays away from what Leland was really addressing, and again the thing I liked about the story is that, for whatever reason, this is a manifestation of blogging that seems to be helping people really deal with real problems. That’s good.