Do Blogs Make You Feel Bad?

I was talking to some friends the other day about the state of the blogosphere. You know how people always blamed beauty magazines for causing women to have low self-esteem? Well, I suppose you already know that blogs can do the same thing pretty easily, causing us to covet each others' "enviable" lives, homes, wardrobes, etc. because they're all so perfectly photographed and shiny.  People don't often share online that they're deeply unhappy, or deeply in debt, or any of the things that make a life real. And I got to thinking about whether or not I contribute to this problem, either with the things I say, or worse, with the things I don't say.

(I mean, OBVIOUSLY you all have LOTS to be jealous of here. Like my incredible baking skills. And my ability to keep my plants alive. And how cute my cat is. Okay, that last one is true.)

"Bully to you if you don't think I'm cute!"

I like my life, but I don't ever want the way I live to make anyone feel worse about themselves. So I started to ask myself: am I my most authentic self online? Am I leading an authentic life offline? And what is the extent to which we're allowed to be "fake"?

A few months ago I had actually fixed my hair and gone to some event, and I've now forgotten what it was. I felt cute. I got home at the end of the day, and as I was washing my hands, I looked in the mirror and ... WHAT THE HELL? I came racing out of the bathroom and into the living room, where Matt was working on his laptop. "IS THIS A GRAY HAIR????????"

"Well, it's certainly not the same color as all the rest of them," he said. He doesn't think gray hairs are that big a deal, as long as no one is telling him how many of them he already has. (Grad school will do that to ya.)

So is it inauthentic or fake, at age 26, to not want others to know that I have gray hairs, and to hide that part of myself? To think maybe it's time to dye it a new color again just so I don't have to worry about a tiny platinum shimmer when I pull my hair up? Does it make someone else — maybe also my age, who also has a gray hair or two — feel bad about themselves because no one else seems to have a problem like theirs? And is this limited to internet life, or does it extend to real life too?

Is it enough to share my flaws and mistakes once in a while, while continuing to share the things that I'm pleased or excited by? Is it always inauthentic to hold back truth?

I will never pretend to be perfect, but I'm simultaneously unwilling to lay my entire life bare just to prove that I am what I say I am. I try to be honest with myself, and with you, because it doesn't make any sense to me to be something I'm not. I'm not interested in make-believe.

Reality, with all its dents and flaws and broken cakes, makes for much better stories.

What do you think? Do blogs make you feel jealous of what others have? How do you strive for balance?