Why I Blog

Image by Sophie Janotta (Pixabay)

I’ve been blogging, on and off, for about 11 years now. I started on Blogger in 2008 before moving over to Squarespace in August 2016. Looking through the blog posts, there are some I didn’t make ‘live’ on the Squarespace blog because they were very much of their time and didn’t make much sense taking up space.

So, what made me start blogging?

I’d visited a few and liked the idea of having an online diary-type thing. At the time, I was very into crafting and thought it might be nice to have my craft projects in one place. I wasn’t after getting continuous traffic to the blog or anything like that; it started as something for me.

Colour me pleasantly surprised when a few people whose blogs I’d been visiting regularly and commenting on returned the favour. It was fun getting to know people from different parts of the world.

As my writing started to take centre stage again over the craft, I changed the focus of my blog to include more writerly stuff.

Image by rawpixel (Pixabay)

I’m the first one to put my hand up and say I had absolutely no clue about what I was doing.

The writer blogs I visited for inspiration were all about writing tips and advice, so I thought I’d post about the hints and tips I’d picked up over the years.

Indulging my love of fairy/folk tales, I also started a section on folk tales from around the world.

According to my stats, I was getting a modest number of visitors, but few commented. To be honest, that bothered me sometimes, especially when I saw the number of comments and interaction that was happening on other blogs. Many times, I fell into the ‘comparison’ game and thought about ditching the blog.

But I continued. Maybe I should have focussed on just the one topic. But I have so many interests – as do we all – and wanted to share as much as I could, regardless of how many people were stopping by.

I blogged about places I’d visited, days out and holidays, castles and museums. I blogged about historical stuff, books I’d read. I blogged about horses, music and art. I even blogged about my divorce and the changes I went through.

Do I have a personal mission as a blogger?

I guess the answer to that is ‘no’. Looking at my blog, it’s easy to see the content isn’t anything that’s going to change people’s lives. But I hope anyone who visits finds something here that’s enjoyable, maybe something that’s helpful, relevant information in a nutshell.

My main reason for continuing to blog is because I enjoy writing. Yes, there are times, I wonder what on earth I’m going to blog about. But, lately, when I sit down at the computer, I find the ideas flow. Here’s hoping I haven’t jinxed myself and struggle the next time I come to write a blog post!