3 Things I Got To Learn From Starting A Blog
“The scariest moment is always just before you start.”
― Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
I had always wanted to start a blog, but I did not know where to start from and I always thought what would I write about and how would I keep getting new content for each blog.
It is because of the thoughts like these, that I did not start my blog sooner. So, I kept procrastinating and the thought of starting my blog was put aside and I kept doing other things.
One day I was like, lets do this and that is what I did, I never would have thought that it feels so amazing to write, now that I have started writing, I can’t stop writing. I just want to keep on writing about something and I am always thinking about the topics on which I could write.
The feeling you get, when you get to write and express what you are feeling is incredible.
I got to learn a lot of things in the pursuit of starting my blog, I got to learn about myself, this hidden love of writing which was buried deep inside somewhere.
Transforming thoughts into words
“One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.”
— Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums
If you had asked me to write a blog a few years back I would not have done it, cause of this fear of writing and not knowing how to express my thoughts in words. This fear is what holds people, like me, back from learning about themselves.
Writing is an Art. An art of transforming your words into thoughts, if you could gain this skill, it will help you in your life, be it in your professional life or your personal blog/journal.
What I did not realize back when I had the fear of writing is that, to learn how to express your thoughts you need to write that is how you learn any art form, without practice you can’t expect to be good at an art as complex as putting into words the feelings you have, which are almost indescribable.
When you start with your own blog and you put out your first blog, it gives you the courage and satisfaction that you can’t get without writing. And once you start a blog, it pushes you to get better at writing.
When you write and every word just seems to click and you publish your blog and you read it and it is all what you wanted it to be, that feeling is incredible, that is what is called the writer’s high.
Learn More
“I kept always two books in my pocket, one to read, one to write in.”
— Robert Louis Stevenson
When you start writing regularly, it pushes you to read more, learn more about the topic that you want to write about. You gain more understanding about the topic that you are writing as you explain it to your readers and you do a lot of research while writing which in turn increases your knowledge.
“If you do not have the time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write” — Stephen King.
Reading provides you with the tools, which are essential in writing. It helps you learn how to string sentences together, how to keep the reader interested, etc.
Most of the ideas you will get on topics to write is while you are reading something.
Reading and writing go hand in hand and are an inseparable part of a writer’s journey.
“Writing helps you Learn, reading helps you write.”
Marketing
After I published my first blog, I knew I had to get this blog to reach as many people as I can but what I did not know is how to do that.
While trying to promote my blog, I ran into some of the concepts of Digital Marketing and Search Engine Optimization (SEO). I tried implementing the concepts I learnt into the blogs I was writing and surely enough my blogs started gaining traction, I got added as a writer on a few publications and my stories started getting curated on Medium.
Which is a big deal, getting curated on Medium is the sure shot way to reach more people, who would not have found your blog and it helps increase your following and viewer base.
I had tried getting into learning Digital Marketing but I did not go through with it before but now that I had a purpose, of promoting my blog, I took initiative and started learning Marketing concepts and started applying them, which is what has helped, without the blog I would probably just have learnt the concepts once and would never have looked back on them.
But as I had a purpose, I not only learnt the concepts I applied them too.
Conclusion
Writing is about learning about yourself and exploring the parts of you that you don’t even know exist.
