This week marks the 1 year anniversary for this blog! For 52 consecutive weeks I have posted every Friday without fail. I’ve covered topics from books I’ve read, to life at University and my thoughts on business.
Some posts have been very successful, with lots of shares, reads and interaction, others not so much… but I’ve still carried on posting. Throughout the year a lot of people have had the same question – why?
I don’t make money from this blog, I haven’t secured a job through it, in honesty the potential external rewards of a blog haven’t really shown up for me. Yet the year has been extremely rewarding. So why do I blog? And what have I learnt?
I’ve learnt how to summarise faster!
On more than one occasion I’ve had to finish the post in a bit of a rush. However I’ve always wanted the quality to be respectable. It used to take days of planning and research for me to write a post. Now, if I know what I want to talk about, it will take 20 minutes.
I’ve noticed the benefits of this in my University work. Finishing coursework with ten minutes to spare, writing the conclusion quickly. Then when receiving the feedback I see a comment “very well written conclusion!” I put this completely down to the summarisation of points I carry out every week in these posts!
Our thoughts are very contradictory
Until you actually understand what your thoughts, beliefs and morals are and then compare them across situations, you won’t quite realise how often you can contradict yourself!
“Always do what you want to do, at the end of the day enjoyment is a priority” is probably a belief I hold true for a number of situations, but then when I write a post about revision it suddenly becomes obvious that I clearly don’t think the initial statement is relevant or even helpful in many other situations.
That self-awareness is so important to understanding how you wish to present yourself and act in different situations.
People don’t ‘hate’, they just don’t care
Before starting my blog I was worried about what people might think, what they would think of me for it. Does it make me sound big headed? Am I talking complete rubbish in my posts? Will people make comments or remarks about it when I see them?
The truth is, most people don’t care enough to form a negative opinion. Most people might read one or two, quite like them but not read another. Never have I had a negative opinion expressed at me for them. Of course, people don’t always agree with the content, but I don’t expect them to.
It has surprised me how many positive comments I have had from people. Often at unexpected times – “oh, by the way, I really liked your blog this week!” Just knowing that someone has taken the time to hear my opinion really makes it worthwhile!
Since starting I have spoken to a number of people wanting to start something similar. I say the same thing “start now and plan later.” The hardest thing is the commitment and motivation to stick at it. If you wait until you have a perfect plan, you’ll never start, if you jump straight in you’d better start getting your content ready otherwise you’ll be missing your deadlines straight away!