Layers of you: are you onion or cake?

Donkey: Oh, you both have LAYERS. Oh. You know, not everybody like onions. What about cake? Everybody loves cake!

Shrek: I don't care what everyone else likes! Ogres are not like cakes.

In my world, the more layers to dig into, the better. Cakes are generally limited to two or three layers. Onion layers go very deep. And they make you cry. On the other hand, cakes are sweet, with even sweeter frosting layered in between....

I'm probably losing you at this point.

So last week I started working through this amazing Online Persona Workshop via the Shrinking Violets Promotions blog  -
which is a happy place for introverts.  I visit there quite often.

I got all excited about this concept of developing an online persona instead of an online platform, since platform seems much scarier to me. And the analogy relating "persona" to a writer's "voice" totally hooked me.

Week 1 helped me identify why I want to be on-line. Primarily to connect with other people - and not just an occasional "hey how are you?" but to really connect.

Like, "come over to my blog and have a cup of tea with me while we chat over life and encourage each other" kind of connection (oh, you say you didn't know about virtual tea parties?) And "next week we'll savor coffee and books and writing craft over at your place." (ah, virtual coffee houses!)

So now I'm reporting on Week 2, which is entitled the Many Layers of You.

Which is how I got distracted talking about onion layers versus cake layers.
Sorry about that.

So anyway, I created this list of all the roles I play (work, family, hobbies, etc), things I care about, and personality traits. In order to "explore all those different facets of ourselves and look for fertile ground from which to create our online persona."

Next step: Go back over your list and look for "traits or layers that feel unique and fresh to you, something that you haven’t seen someone else do already, AND that gets a little flutter of interest or passion moving when you think about it."

Okay, that was hard. I wasn't seeing anything unique on my list.
But I did get a few passionate flutters:

From my list of things I'm intrigued about:
mythical creatures (My regular readers will not be surprised about that one)

From my list of favorite things to do:
Having "soul-talks" with friends over tea (or coffee. Or virtual chocolate. Which is the best kind because it has no calories. Well... "best" might be up to debate.)
"Soul-talks"? you ask. You know, conversations that go beyond the weather or the cute things our kids did last week (not that I don't love kid stories! don't get me wrong!). But I also like to go a little deeper... what we've learned, from our kids. Or from that great book we just read. What we're still trying to learn. Awful things that have happened. Wonderful things that occurred because of the awful things. Realizing that something just changed our perception of how we see the world, or some small part of the world.

From my list of work-related things:
I'm a software trainer and university lecturer (GIS and geography). I'm always looking for ways to engage students - helping them see how to apply  geographic concepts and GIS tools to their own work or research needs.

From my list of personality traits:
"Introvert" was too obvious, so I picked "slave to my moods". Yeah. That explains the chocolate addiction. And also the "I can't deal with life right now; let me escape to my corner with a book for a while" attitude.

With your highlighted items, the Workshop says to look for connections:

A Shrinking Violet's list includes.... unintentional collector of clutter, research geek, writing craft junkie, poor housekeeper. However, looking over that shorter list I also know that there are a TON of other writing oriented blogs out there already, so I would probably cross that one off. I would also suspect there are other blogs out there about being a poor housekeeper, but is there one that combines that with being a writer? IS there a way to do that?

Unfortunately, I didn't get very far with online personas like:

 Margo's Moods,


or  Margo's Inspiring Geographic Analogies,


or Margo's Soul Talks, A little scary, don't you think?

or Margo's Mythical Creatures?  Oh wait a minute, I'm already writing a novel about that and don't want to give it all away too soon (grin).

But then, THEN! I started working on Week Three! And there were Discoveries! Revelations! Fascinating Connections Were Made! All to be revealed in next week's installment.

Since I've already violated my 500 word blog post limit by, like, 267 words and counting - I have one last thing that's be on my mind to mention.

Elizabeth Taylor. The passing of a legend. She was always a memorable character in my life because my father often referred to my mother as "his very own Elizabeth Taylor." 
 I'm happy to say that my mother is still in great health and full of life, and this picture reminds me a bit of a down-home sort of Liz:

Which layer analogy do you like better, onion or cake or...?