Why I Blog

I’m having trouble starting this post, partly because I’m not sure I should even be writing it. When I launched Aliventures, I had no plans to write about blogging. I didn’t think it would be of much interest to most people reading.

However, a few good folk (including Charlie Gilkey) have nudged me to occasionally say a little more about blogging. After all, I spend a lot of time doing it. I’ve written somewhere over six hundred blog posts in the past two years, on dozens of sites. I get paid to write for several large blogs; I have my blogging “home base” here on Aliventures, and I have a couple of dormant blogs which I enjoyed while they lasted. I love guest posting on different blogs, and wish I had more time for it.

On any given day, there’s a high chance I’ll be writing a blog post (usually several). Here, I’m going to take a shot at explaining why – what blogging means to me, how it helps me to grow, and how it lets me get more out of life.

Blogging Beginnings

The earliest blogs were, essentially, online journals. If you’ve dabbled in blogging, you might well have started with something like this – I know I did. My first blog was incredibly self-indulgent, boring, and probably read by about three people: it dealt with my experiences in my first year as an undergraduate. It lasted, sporadically, for perhaps a year.

I was drawn to blogging because it combined my two key interests: writing and computers. (I was so torn between these two as a teenager that, for a while, I considered applying for Computer Science instead of English at university.) Creating a blog means I get to play around with words and with code. It’s geek heaven.

Blogging as a Form

I’m a writer. I can’t imagine being happy without being able to put words onto a page, in some form or another. But blogging is far from my only outlet: I’m working on a novel, an ebook, and a non-fiction book at present.

So why blog, specifically? What’s its advantage over other mediums?

I’m not good at being patient. I like to see fast progress, quick results and clear feedback. This is one of the reasons that I really enjoy blogging: I can come up with an idea, write a piece, edit it, publish it and get a response from readers all in the same day.

I also like to finish things. My other projects are all ongoing ones which require steady commitment; while Aliventures itself is an ongoing project, each post is a complete piece. You can come here, read one post and leave again – and it’s still meaningful.

But a blog is, I believe, more than the sum of its parts. After all, if I just wanted to produce complete written pieces that each communicated a message, I could send them to one of the many article directories on the internet, or I could publish them as forum posts.

I’m not just creating a series of discrete items; I’m building a blog which is a reflection of me. (That’s why I started Aliventures six months ago, instead of just writing for blogs owned by other people – I enjoy doing that, but creating and growing my own site is a whole different kind of fun.)

Blogging as a Process

When I write here, I’m often trying to work something through in my own mind: some posts arise because of problems that I’m having, or questions which I’m wrestling with. I find that the writing process helps me to clarify my thoughts. When I choose a topic and explore it in a post, I create coherence, order and structure.

As an undergraduate student, I had to write an essay each week, on whatever text(s) we were currently studying. The point of this wasn’t the end result (no-one, apart  from my supervisor and occasionally a fellow student, would ever read the essays) … the point was to understand those texts in a deeper way.

What I get out of blogging differs depending on where I’m writing. While researching, I’ll often learn something, or have my preconceptions challenged. When I write, I might find that something which seemed like a side point emerges as the main part of the post.

And when I’ve finished a post, I always have a sense of accomplishment. In my old office job, it was hard to get that – tasks were often ongoing (software testing) and they didn’t leave me with something that I could point at and say “I created this today.”

Blogging as a Social Activity

On the face of it, blogging isn’t exactly social. I sit here in my flat, at my desk, typing. I have no colleagues, and most of the bloggers who I “know” live half-way across the world.

However, being a blogger makes me feel that I’m very much part of a community. Although there are millions of blogs online, bloggers seem to cluster in smaller groups. I’ve come to know people through their blogs who I count as friends.

Writing blogs has been a way for me to meet people who share my interests and values. These people affirm me; they make me feel that what I’m doing is worthwhile. We learn from one another, and carry on conversations spread across the net. It’s a great feeling!

Reading other people’s blogs often makes me feel that I know more about them than I know about “real life” friends. A blogger’s voice, and subject matter, reveals their personality, their interests, and the way they think about things. All of that helps me feel that I “know” many people who I’ve never met. It’s similar to the experience I have on my postgraduate course, meeting fellow fiction-writers in an environment where we feel able to share our dreams.

Blogging as a Message

When I dig back over the past years of my life, one consistent theme for me is that I’m often touched by the potential I see in others, and I want to help them to be and do all that they’re capable of. My world view here is heavily influenced by my belief in a Creator God who loves each one of us, unconditionally and eternally. I don’t tend to say much about my religion here (I’m a Christian), but it sits at the centre of my life and my work.

In my blogging, especially here on Aliventures, I’m trying to communicate a message of encouragement and hope. I love it when people comment or email to say that they were inspired by a post, or that it simply made them feel better about their life, because that’s one of the things I love to be able to do – in real life, not just in blogging.

I didn’t want to start yet another personal development blog – there’s already so much good material out there. I wanted to explore some issues which don’t get written about much, things like how hard it can be to go against what society, family and friends are telling you to do, or how important it is to find value in something other than being busy and productive.

I’m not sure I can sum up what I’m trying to say, here on Aliventures and in my blogging and writing as a whole, in a sentence. Here’s a rough attempt:

You are a unique, valuable and lovable person. You have skills and interests which allow you to contribute something special to the world. You have the power to make your life into whatever you want it to be.

Blogging as a Money-Maker

I hesitated to include this section, because I know it brings up mixed feelings. But I’d be being misleading, if not downright dishonest, if I left it out.

I make money from blogging. Most of this is from working as a staff blogger (a paid writer for a big blog); some is advertising revenue from my blogs (only a tiny fraction of that is from Aliventures), and affiliate income. My blogging has also helped me market a self-study ecourse, the Staff Blogging Course, which has proved much more popular than I’d imagined it would!

I’m grateful each day that I get to make money from doing something I enjoy. I’m not simply grateful for the people and circumstances in my life which have made it possible, but I’m grateful to my former self for ignoring the culturally-conditioned idea that “no-one pays you to have fun”.

(If you want to find out a way to quit your day job and do something which you love: after all, you’ll probably contribute something of considerably more value if you enjoy doing it. Try my free ebook, Quit Your Day Job, to get you started.)

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Update: I’ve now launched The Blogger’s Guide to Effective Writing: if you’re interested in the writing side of blogging, check it out, and if it’s right for you, pop in the discount code “Aliventures” (no quotes) for a $5 discount.