POST 100 | What I’ve learned about myself through blogging

OMG… How on earth is this my 100th blog post?! For this “special” post, I thought it was appropriate to write a little reflection piece on blogging, or at least my blogging experience so far.

Here are four things I’ve learned about myself through the process of starting Anchored to Sunshine.

1) I have very organized weeks, and very unorganized weeks

As every blogger knows, you have some weeks where blog ideas come pouring out, and other weeks where you feel as if your mind is blank. Or, you may have ideas, but just don’t have the time to sit down and write something. I hate to admit it, but most of my blog writing occurs at 5am before I get started on the rest of my day. There is just no other time I have found when the world in quiet enough to let me blog in peace.

2) I’m not a photographer

I’m just not the best photographer (note photo above), I’ve always known this. My photos have gotten (slightly) better since my very first blog post, but there is still much more room for improvement. Also, I get easily embarrassed taking pictures in public of myself or my food. I will sometimes even force the boyfriend to take the pictures of the food or random items in a restaurant (ex: this wonderful picture taken by the boyfriend to capture the awesome exploded barrel chandelier at a local wine room).

3) I eat my meal before I remember to take pictures of it

Seriously, this is a problem for two reasons:

A) I can’t resist food the moment it’s placed in front of me.
B) Look back at point 2…. I’m not the best at picture taking, but I’m working on it.

4) I need to blog for myself, not others

When I first started blogging, I expected followers to flood to my site. Hundreds of clicks, dozens of followers a day… that just didn’t happen.

I would sit down every morning to see if my followers increased at all, usually it was just by one person (if any at all). Of course this made me feel a bit defeated.

One day (after looking at my stats for the 5th day in a row with no new followers) I made a rule: I can only check my number of followers once a week. That made me focus more on the blogs and less on gaining followers. I decided to focus on blogging for my own enjoyment, and that made blogging a much more positive experience. I’m blogging for me, and I love it! The followers will come one day :)

Did you feel the same way when you started your blog? Any helpful tricks or tips you have learned along the way? I have found the best resource to turn to are other bloggers, so any advice is welcomed and appreciated!