The Two True Fundamentals of Blogging

Many of us are still getting quickly caught up in the exciting and profitable genre of blogging. I’m no different. Ever since I started Wordful two months ago, I too have enjoyed the low barrier of entry that blogging offers, not to mention being part of multiple conversations and most of all — the limitless freedom of expression.

But I’ve got a dirty confession to make: it took over three months from the time I decided to start blogging to the time I actually did it. Any why is this? Very simple: I was thinking too much. I was thinking about everything I needed to do to get going, who I wanted to become and how much money I wanted to make. All the time I spent just thinking led to a blog with nothing on it.

There’s nothing wrong with thinking — or dreaming for that matter — but it must be balanced with action. Thought and action are the two true fundamentals of blogging, which can be further refined to creativity and writing. One cannot co-exsit without the other, otherwise you’d end up with thoughtless action or actionless thought (think about that for a quick minute). Neither scenario is productive to us blog writers and our hopes of success.

Blogging vs. the Idea of Blogging

The human mind can be abundantly creative. There’s nothing more enjoyable than imagining the potential of our greatest ideas. This is why I was drawn to blogging — it marries my fundamental love of writing with the 10+ years I spent working with the internet. I knew that I had finally found my niche after so many years of bouncing around with things I thought I could succeed at (you can read about that here).

For several weeks, my dreams, plans, goals and thoughts were like opened floodgates as I planned and scrutinized every possible detail of the Wordful blog in my head. I read every possible related blog and expert’s report I could get my hands on. Several more weeks went by and my emotions calmed down. I was still having occasional bursts of excitement – but it became increasingly sad and obvious that the only blog I had was the one in my head!

What You Can Do About This

Now that I’ve stated actually blogging, and creating real posts that real people can read, I can offer the following advice:

• Carry a notebook and pencil with you like a photographer carries a camera. You need to be able to capture your ideas at any given time. Don’t rely on scratch paper because they’ll get lost, and transcribing is a waste of time. Don’t worry about people looking at you funny, either, because it’s not as funny looking as you think.
• Learn the natural rhythms of your creativity. Nobody is “on” all the time. When you feel like your thoughts aren’t as exciting as they were earlier, sit down and write. By writing, you’ll accomplish two great things: you’ll have created something to publish, and your creativity will be restored (or even heightened).
• Write consistently, even when you know it sucks. Sometimes we have neither the mental energy to think about nor act upon our blogs, especially if you’re new and unknown and sometimes discouraged like me. And I’ll be totally honest here: I know this post is not one of my best. In fact, I’m pretty disappointed that it’s taken me almost a week to write this and I feel like erasing it and starting over. But here I am: finishing, publishing, moving on. If I can do it so can you.

Let’s End This For Both Your Sake and Mine

It’s often more enjoyable and less strenuous to think about writing than it is to write about what you’ve been thinking. Understand that the brilliant ideas swirling through your mind will equal zero results if you don’t take action on them. Your blog’s audience, niche, comments, traffic, monetization, social media, etc. all depend on you actually writing, not just thinking.

Get past this and the rest is cake, I promise.

Update: check out this magic solution for turning thought into action.