on blogging

Sometimes, I think about how it kinda sucks that the passion I feel so called and drawn to (writing, or blogging) essentially requires winning a popularity contest to make a living.

Whether that’s for authoring a book, building a blog, or any artist’s work, creating something as your life’s calling basically requires patrons to purchase some piece of said creation if you wish to make a living from your purpose.

Ah, purpose, there you are again. I’ve been obsessed with life purpose for all of my quarter-life-crisis-turned-spiritual-awakening. Come to find out, there’s a good explanation for my passion in this area. Which, I learned from exploring my personality. It’s in my pattern for “at work & in the world”:

“You’re intended to find work that feels like a calling – something that’s sacred to you. Try not to let yourself be driven by materialism. You’re intended to be more focused on spiritual pursuits or healing and helping others. It should feel like you were born to do your job. Although it can be challenging to find a career that provides both meaning and financial security, something will seem amiss if your work doesn’t align with your values.”

The Pattern iPhone app

I value writing, reading others’ writings, and the sharing of stories in general. It’s the best way I know of to build empathy between human beings.

And I definitely want to become financially free from just living my dream life and writing about it.

realization from past blogs

In high school, I learned what Xanga was and read others’ online diaries, but never launched into my own.

In college, I created a tumblr for a “picture-a-day” project that turned into many different iterations of blogging over the course of sophomore thru senior years, and began another very short-lived tumblr when we were first moving into the RV.

While I was a recruiter and executive assistant, I attempted and stopped something like 6 or 7 different WordPress free blogs.

Most recently, I’d begun and abandoned two self-hosted WordPress blogs, danielleconqueso.com and em-pathetic.com.

And in all those times of starting and stopping blogs, do you know what never happened? No one ever reached out angrily demanding further content. I didn’t get chastised for falling off the posting wagon. No one put pressure on me to come back to blogging.

Therefore, I can know that every time I felt called to try again at the blogging thing, it wasn’t coming from any external pressure. It was coming from within me.

I mean, not everyone wakes up every day and thinks about how much they desire to become a full-time blogger. Now that I know it’s possible, how could I not chase this dream?

Oh right, because of the hang-ups I’ve had around blogging as a biz.

blogging blocks

I’ve been self-sabotaging from committing to making a living from blogging for as long as I’ve felt interested in the blogger life.

It’s almost that I feel like, because I have been interested and intrigued by the concept, I’ve done research and attended webinars and perused online course materials for how to build an income from blogging, so now that I’m aware and can’t claim ignorance, I can’t have the whole “I just started blogging because I’m writing about something I’m passionate about and then was so shocked when it started making an income!” story.

I know too much, and because I know, now unless I am doing everything “by the books” and implementing “blog to biz” strategies from the beginning, then I feel like I’m just wasting time trying to figure things out for myself that people already worked out the systems for. But then, if I create content with the intent to make money from it, that’s inauthentic! Selling out! Being materialistic when I’m meant to solely focus on my higher calling for writing!

Well, you know what? I’m tired of feeling like if I’m not doing life by someone else’s rules, then I’m doing it wrong.

(Also a reason I started learning to read Tarot, by the way.)

((And, it’s not materialistic to want to make an honest living from creating art and writing words that have the potential to help people, dear inner critic!))

I’m tired of trying to fit what I want to write into a “niche,” or, box. And since I’ve focused so much on it myself, I want to eventually figure out a way to help others live their passions with purpose, so I better start living by the beat of my own dreams first.

(Although, another block of mine around blogging is how so many biz bloggers make money by teaching others how to blog so it’s blogging about blogging which just seems pyramid-schemey to me, but then again, you could say the same thing for writing about writing, or any personal development program teaching you how to coach personal development. Anyways, I digress, the point is…)

There’s so much information out there on the internet these days, and it gets overwhelming with every option and opportunity for what we think we “should” be doing.

So, this is me, saying… fuck it.

I’m going to blog, how I want to blog, and write about what I want to write about every day.

Then maybe by me just stepping into this personal passion of blogging, I’ll discover what pieces of things I’m saying are resonating with people and potentially helping in some way.

And I love that that’s what blogging can be. If I want to try out some new motivational mindset or productivity plan for myself and share any life design hacks I discover along the way, then I can. If I want to make a meal plan of recipes + ways to reuse the leftovers and call my cookbook “A Whole New Meal” complete with an Aladdin-parody theme song, I can. And, I can document my figuring out if writing novels is one dream I truly do want to live as part of my writing journey.

I get to wake up every day and try out something new in my life, and share the stories I think could help someone else in my own unique sacred way.

There’s no better time than the present to JUST DO IT!

signs from the universe to claim my dream life as a blogger

I don’t watch or read the news as a personal rule. I have always loved my practice of living in my bubble when it comes to attempting to shield my energy from all the fear and anxiety perpetuated by the media. If someone asks me for my political opinion, I’ll say, “Oh yeah sure, I don’t like politics.”

I don’t really enjoy researching or educating myself on world news events. (Be they economical or social or political.) I sometimes feel like an irresponsible citizen because of this. So basically, what I’m trying to say is — I don’t know a ton about COVID-19 and I’m never going to be a blogger who offers well-researched guides on anything making history probably.

But, what I do know is that staying home seems to be the best response to the craziness happening around us at the present moment.

I think another thing that’s been holding me back from committing to saying “I’m a full-time blogger” has been… my own indecision (shocker). I’ve been constantly going back and forth in my mind as to whether I should treat my writing like a business. Or, if that’s just too long of an uncertain timeline income-wise, and I should really just go get a job to earn a paycheck, then my writing can be my passion project on the side.

Welp, there’s nothing like the current situation eliminating the possibility of getting a job outside of the home to help push me to commit to blogging!