The Internet has been challenging for someone like me, who is not a natural listener and who worked alone and unreachable for much of my life.

I’m now connected to the world wide Web; tens of millions of people – billions, theoretically – who have access to my blogging and my opinions, and many of them are eager to tell me what to think, write and do.

These are often strangers, they do not know me, and I do not know them. I’m sitting out there like a giant white whale. I choose to write in this medium, which suits me, and I take responsibility for that.

We live in a shameless time. There is no possibility of consequence, accountability, or punishment for lies, conspiracy theories, cruelty, or threats.

These kinds of messages have become epidemic in the years since Donald Trump became President and have poisoned our civil discourse. Not only was he not punished or rejected for this, but he was also worshipped,  elevated, and elected President. He is revered to this day.

President Trump legitimized lying openly and hating people who think differently or in opposition to him. That was and is a tragedy for our democracy, a blasphemy of what made America so crucial to the world. Ron DeSantis is his unacknowledged child.

Everyone who writes in public or online has felt this ugly change. This threw me, the child of immigrants who loved America,  off balance.

For most of my life, I was a reclusive book writer; I only interacted with readers only on friendly book tours funded by my publisher.

I have this idea in my head that somebody needs to challenge trolls, busybodies, emotionally disturbed, and rude and inclusive people when they send me messages that I feel are hostile and disrespectful. But I am learning this is not my job or my purpose. I need a better idea.

Sometimes I overreact, and too often, too quickly and too sharply. I am a busy person, pressured by work, pictures, blogging, and life; some of these messages trigger old and ugly things in me. I get a lot of e-mails, and I’ve learned to answer in brisque and sometimes thoughtless ways.

I have suffered from mental illness and can often be triggered by what I perceive as assaults, especially unjust ones.

When I wrote about its birth as a media critic, I always thought the Internet would help democracy, not tear it down. A mad genius like Elon Musk in such a powerful position was not conceivable.

I have been working – often unsuccessfully – to understand how to respond appropriately to all of this fury, and my anger and quick trigger finger, and this week, a blog reader named Gretchen has helped me break through this pattern and move ahead. Perhaps unwittingly, she crystallized my ambitions for my blog.

I want the blog to be a safe and positive place. A safe, creative, and gentle place.

Anger and nastiness are incompatible with the person I hope to be or the blog I love so much. There is a Jekyll and Hyde in there.

This is already changing. I’ve had intensive discussions with a therapist about it, and I am doing better at listening to the people who criticize me, especially those of goodwill. I have no apologies to make to the cruel and arrogant.

I am slow to listen sometimes, but I never give up trying to hear.

By sticking with me in a sometimes intense dialogue,   Gretchen has helped me see things in a different light. I’ve set a new goal for myself, and I think I will stick with it.

She and I had a dialogue that speaks to the great potential of the Internet to communicate with people rather than argue with them. It turned out to be productive and very important to me.

This exchange began when Gretchen told me she thought I was too often rude and nasty to people I felt were hostile or intrusive. I asked her why this was her business, a question I often ask people I believe to be too pushy or intrusive. Usually, they have no answer and offer no reply.

Gretchen was different. She replied.

Her first letter: “I’m asking because I’m one of your readers and have been a donor. But I’m concerned about recommending the blog and the programs you raise funds for because you seem unable to let the typical internet trolls slide. Your nasty bite-back lowers you to their level. I find it uncomfortable, and it has caused me, and a few others I know, to hold back support of you.”

I was hurt and angered by the letter, I didn’t accept her characterization of me as too dangerous or cruel to read safely, and I still don’t, but I sensed her goodwill and sincerity. She responded thoughtfully and courteously to my replies, and I realized this was a good and valuable reader who deserved respect and honest dialogue, even if we disagreed.

We were communicating, not posturing. It became a conversation, not an argument.

That is something increasingly rare online or in America. We are forgetting how to speak gently to one another.

I’ve realized lately that a trigger for me is a message’s hostile, pompous, or cruel tone. People who disagree with me openly and civilly are welcome and valued. I love to argue. People who civilly write me rarely have a problem. I have to change the way I see it.

After some back and forth – the tone of both of us seemed to improve; we were beginning to talk as one human being to another, not remote and disconnected beings who did not know or understand each other.

She thought I was being cruel and “nasty,” as she put it, I had no idea where she was coming from or why she was making these arguments.

We did not know one another. The blog, in my mind, is not a dangerous place, too volatile for her friends.

This was the breakthrough message from Gretchen to me:

I don’t mean to tell you what to do or to intrude. Your brusque clap-back replies to people you perceive as rude or intrusive are unsettling. I’ve seen this happening, as have you, since I began writing internet content professionally in 1999. I’ve been reading your blog since 2007, and I appreciate you. I don’t know; perhaps I’ve grown fragile to so much snark on the Web. Your blog is, for me, a place of creativity and gentle warmth; I guess I’m seeking refuge from other, less spiritual Web sites, but I have no business asking of you.

This struck home with me—her tone had changed, revealing the natural person underneath. I liked that person right away. And this is a spiritual website. She even embraced a boundary few people accept. She does not have a right to tell me what to do. I do not have the right to be “nasty” or cruel.

I’ve been progressing on this issue; I’m deleting about 90 percent of negative messages without comment. A part of me still clings to this idea that I am obliged to respond to cruelty. But I don’t.

Gretchen’s final message struck home with me.

It rang true.

She had revealed herself as a thoughtful and caring person who wasn’t comfortable with my anger showing up on a website meant to be a haven and refuge from what she called the “snark’ of the Web world.

Her blog vision further touched me by invoking the idea of a creative, spiritual, and gentle place, a kind of refuge from the madness, chaos, and violence of our world. That is what I want it to be.

I thanked her for her courtesy and thoughtfulness, and she said she had decided to stay with me as I worked this out (I told her she had to make up her own mind, I couldn’t help her).

You can’t ask for more than that, and I didn’t and don’t.

I asked my Web designers to change the sub-title of the blog from Love.Care.Hope to “Creativity And Gentle Warmth…” That will happen next week.

I write about trying because I want to be okay with failing.

I write about anger because I want to be better.

I write about being good because I want to do good.

I write about joy because I know sorrow.

I write about gratitude because I am thankful – for all of it.