Has it been a year already? You know what they say, “time flies when you’re complaining to strangers on the internet!”

If I’m being honest, my depressed brain assumed that I would give up on doing this blog only a few weeks in. Or at least, I’d post a lot less frequently because I didn’t have any ideas. I’m proud of myself for sticking with it and impressed that I’ve made it this far. Nothing makes you prouder of your abilities than defying the self-degrading assumption that you’ll fail for no reason!

But really, keeping up with this blog is important, because in a lot of ways, blogging has helped me. And because I’m ridiculously sentimental, I’m going to dedicate this blog post to those ways.

 

Forcing Me to Write

As I’ve talked about previously in the post “My Love/Hate Relationship with Routine,” I struggle to make things part of my routine, but once they’re established in my routine, it gets a bit easier. I also mentioned how I need external motivation to do things, and without that motivation, I will come up with any excuse not to do something. Writing is one of the things that brings me the most joy in life. It’s one of those activities that makes time stand still for me and puts a smile on my face, but without a reason to write, I don’t make any time for it. I fill up my schedule with everything else I can think of besides writing.

This blog forces me to sit down at least once a week and crank out some material. Whether I actually use said material for this blog, for something else, or not at all, I still sit down to write because I have to. And I’ve never been happier to have an obligation. I’ve read several bloggers tweet about taking a break from blogging for self-care. I totally understand that’s necessary for some people, but for me, blogging is my self-care. I write out of obligation to myself, and if I let my one reason to write slip away, I know that I won’t stick with it.

 

Improving My Writing

I’m a good writer. I’ve said it once, I’ll say it 100 times. I’m so happy to finally allow myself to admit it unapologetically that you may get sick of hearing it. I’m not sorry. I’m more than happy to listen to you tell me all about what you’re good at. You can listen to me rant about idioms and prepositions once a week, okay Barbara?!?!?

Writing is a passion of mine, and one reason for that is that every grammar rule I have ever learned is cemented into my head. My high school freshman year honors English class is where I realized how amazing grammar is and how talented I am at correcting grammatical discrepancies. Under the tutelage of Mrs. Roberts, I started to understand my talent for writing. Mrs. Roberts passed away recently and I realized how much her class shaped me as a person. Without her, I don’t know if I would ever find my penchant for grammar and writing. I owe her for my skill, this blog, and any other writing projects that I take on. It’s thanks to her that I’m a good writer.

Just because I’m a good writer doesn’t mean that I can’t get better, though. I have plenty of room for improvement in my writing as well as room to grow and try other writing styles, but I can’t get better without practice.

Since this blog is giving me the accountability and motivation I need to write every week, I am now practicing my writing more regularly and seeing where I can improve. As part of the writing community on Twitter, I see many writers posting thought-provoking questions, some of which are about personal writing pitfalls. After reading several comments from other writers, I was able to more easily spot shortcomings in my writing as well. I’m not going to tell you here what my typical mistakes are because then you’ll notice them and point them out to me. 

What? I said that I was willing to admit that I can improve, I didn’t say that I wanted to be attacked for every little thing!

 

Thinking Outside of the Box

Coming up with blog topics is tough. Sometimes I have a flood of ideas, but more often than not, even if I do have the energy to write, I don’t have any topics in mind. I regularly resort to harassing my friends and family for topics, but usually just end up panicking at the last second and writing about whatever random thing pops into my head. 

So I’m working on retraining my brain to zero in on topics that I have a lot of feelings or funny comments about when they pop into my head at random. I’ve been trying to focus more on errant thoughts to see if I can make blog posts out of them. 

But the difficulty doesn’t end there. Once I start writing about a topic, I tend to run out of things to say about it prematurely. This means that I have to think outside the box to come up with more angles to approach topics. Now that I am forcing myself to think outside the box more for my blog, I have started thinking outside the box in everyday life, too. Whether it’s a problem at work or in my home life, I’ve begun to come up with new approaches. For someone that lost that imaginative spark years ago, I’m happy to start getting it back.

 

Gaining More Confidence

I highly recommend doing something that you know that you’re good at and enjoy every week. Period. If what you are good at and enjoy is easy to complete regularly, put it into your schedule. Right. Now. 

Writing every week has helped to completely boost my confidence and has given me a sense of purpose. While I sometimes groan about having to write and don’t always have topics in mind, at the end of the day, I’m proud of the content that I create.

 

Blogging once a week may not be easy, but it has definitely made my life better. Thank you for joining me on the first year of my adventure, and here’s to many happy {returns}.

 

Photography by my talented fiancé. You can find him on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/hope_grows_here/