My First Blogiversary – 7 Things I Wish I Knew Before Starting A Blog

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Exactly one year ago, on 10 May 2021, I hit publish on my very first blog post. I didn’t know what I was doing but I’ve been always dreaming about writing a blog and finally got some courage to do so. I just created my first digital planner, and I hoped the blog would help me bring more traffic into my Etsy shop. A lot has changed since then!

This year was all about getting used to blogging and learning. I changed my niche twice, spent countless hours on choosing topics I want to write about, and had to take two long breaks to rethink my strategy. That’s why I posted only 22 posts during last year. It’s not an impressive number, but hey, it’s still better than nothing. While I’m still not sure what I feel most comfortable writing about, and usually I’m anxious to write anything at all, I like it and want to continue on this journey.

Thank you to every single one of you for visiting my blog. Your support means a world to me!

What I wish I knew before starting a blog

Blogging takes a lot of time

But I still love it. This blog isn’t the first one I’ve created in my life. I used to have one full of cringey “Dear diary” type of entries, and a few more serious ones where I tried to share my thoughts on random topics. I also was a copywriter in the past so I’ve heard this and that about SEO. That saying, I kind of knew what I’m getting into. 

What I didn’t know was the time needed to do the research, choose topics to write about or optimize posts. I’ve never tracked how much time exactly it takes to put together a blog post, but I’d say it’s around 15-20 hours. This time goes into planning, researching, writing, taking photos, and editing. My latest walk from Dover to Deal took me an entire day to complete, so it gives an additional 8 hours that went to prepare and write an article about it.

Each day is different, and because I take care of my daughter during the day, it’s difficult to set strict blocks of time to write and create content. My ability to focus in a not-so-perfect environment is almost nonexistent and writing slows down immensely. This year I’d love to improve time management and hopefully start posting twice a week. That would be really awesome!

Done is better than perfect

When I just started blogging, I strived for perfection. Now, when I look back on some of my first posts, I don’t understand why I thought they were perfect, but that’s what the “Edit” button is for, isn’t it? In all seriousness, I’m glad to know that I improved somewhere along the way.

I couldn’t let go of perfectionism. Nothing was good enough, no matter how hard I tried. I’ve spent countless hours editing my photos and researching presets I like just to end up frustrated and overwhelmed. Nothing looked the way I wanted. I know my photos aren’t perfect and I’m sure I’ll want to re-edit them in the future. Hopefully, nobody will mind that I’m not consistent with the way I edit them.

The same goes for writing. I’ve been experimenting and spending hours on rewriting one post multiple times, hoping to get better results. I even tried AI to rewrite some paragraphs so no-one realize it wasn’t written by a native.

As some of you might know, English is not my first language. In the beginning, I spent a lot of time looking at blogs created by other people, mostly from English-speaking countries. It felt so disheartening to read their pieces and know that I’m not able to write so beautifully! I had just one thought running through my mind constantly: What’s the point of it if I’ll never be as good as them?

Even though I try my best to share only quality content, I’m sure that it could be better. I finally realized that practice makes perfect, and I basically had to options to choose from:

a) start blogging and try my best;

b) do nothing, keep whining, and regret that decision in the future.

I think I made a good choice.

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You need to have a clear vision

One of my favourite things to do in my free time used to be scrolling mindlessly through Instagram and Facebook. I can’t say that it was very smart of me to do, but it showed me of thing I love about content creation the most – ability to succeed in million different ways. I like the fact that everyone can choose a unique path and experience different things along the way. It has one major disadvantage though – you can go astray once you see how many things might help you succeed or bring some money quickly.

It happened to me more than once. I started writing different posts just because I saw similar ones getting lots of positive comments on social media. I’ve never finished writing them and probably will never do, so I basically just waste my time for nothing. After a while I got overwhelmed and lost vision I once had. This is where I realized I should take a break and figure out which way I really want to go.

This experience taught me how important is having a clear vision and knowing the reason behind your actions. No more chasing opportunities, losing focus, and wasting time on things that don’t align with you and your vision.

I knew from the very beginning that having clear vision is important, but as I’m interested in many things, it’s difficult to choose just one or two to focus on. That’s why I’m still deciding what I want to pursue and what feels the most aligned, but I’m learning to trust myself and give some freedom to experiment. It hasn’t been a smooth ride, but I finally stopped feeling burned out, lost, and overwhelmed.

Be yourself

If you don’t like something, change it. You’re responsible for your happiness and, in this case, how your blog will look like and what path you’ll go. It can be very difficult to post consistently if you keep looking for external validation. I know how it feels when nobody understands what you’re doing and why. It’s so easy to lose yourself and try to prove them something, especially when you spend hours on something and you don’t earn any money yet.

It’s a long process to stop caring what others think about what you’re doing. Take your time and work on that, as that’s the only way to achieve freedom in all aspects of your life. Try new things even if you know you might fail. Write about anything you want to find your favourite topics. Change the direction you’re going towards. Adjust your goals if they don’t feel aligned with you anymore. Take ownership of your life and stop wasting your time worrying about other people’s opinion. Have the courage to follow your instincts and trust yourself. It will pay off in the future.

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Start now and never look back

“The best time to start was yesterday. The next best time is now.”
~Unknown

I love to learn everything that’s possible about something, and start when I have a pretty good idea what I’m doing. That’s what I tried to do this time – I read as many articles as possible and went through some courses just to learn all about starting a blog. I was anxious to take a step forward and buy a domain, as I still didn’t feel ready. Next few months showed me that even though I didn’t know what I was doing, I was learning and improving along the way.

I wish I’d started sooner, although I’m happy I started at all. If you want to start a new project, do it now, because you never be ready. My first posts were bad, and that’s completely normal. Everyone had to start somewhere, after all. There is no shortcut or magic formula that will make your first posts perfect or that will make you successful over night. Blogging is a marathon, not a sprint. Keep going, you never know what the future holds for you. Always remember that practice makes perfect. 

After a year of blogging, I’m happy I started it at all and never regretted it.

You can do anything, not everything

When you start a blog, you need to wear many hats. Now you’re a website designer, content writer, editor, photographer, traveller, and many, many more. I believe you can do anything you want to, but you need some boundaries. There are just 24 hours in a day, so you need to learn to say no, prioritize and sometimes delegate some work to focus on what really matters.

Take a break

Remember to take breaks and days off, even from your blog! It’s exhausting doing all that work on your own, 7 days a week. It’s also the fastest way to experience burnout. When I just started blogging, I was trying to work literally all the time. I didn’t go out anywhere unless I really had to, and my thoughts were always circling around the website, Instagram, and content creation. At some point I was sleeping just 5-6 hours a day, because I kept feeling like I hadn’t done enough during the day.

It took me a very long time to understand that what I was doing was as counterproductive as humanly possible. I was exhausted all the time, I couldn’t focus, I wrote terrible posts that I had to edit multiple times and they still sucked. 

Don’t make the same mistakes as I did, and schedule in some rest. Go for a walk, spend some time with family and friends, get 8 hours of sleep at night. It will be difficult at first but it’s so so worth it. There is nothing better than spending the entire day in nature to recharge and getting back to work rested and energized. Trust me on that!

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My first blogiversary: 5 most popular posts I wrote in my first year of blogging

1. Serene walk from Margate to Broadstairs (Viking Coastal Trail)
2. 6 proven ways to deal with moving away from family
3. 10 scenic walks in and around St Ives, Cambridgeshire
4. 2021 Cost of living in Liverpool (by a local)
5. What To Pack When Moving Abroad – The Ultimate Packing List For Moving Abroad

Well, there it is. My first full year of blogging. If you’re still reading this, thank you so much for being here! It truly means a world to me. I hope you enjoyed this slightly more personal post about my experience as a blogger. Hitting one year of blogging is a big milestone for me and I’m really proud of myself! I can’t wait to see how this place will grow in the future – I hope that you’ll stay with me during this amazing journey. Cheers!