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With beginning of yet another endless summer, the clouds finally clear, sun beating down upon us, and girls in bikinis dotting the southern California beaches (well, when I wrote this it was sunny), I look back at where I was this time last year and I’m truly grateful for how much starting this site has changed my life. For the most part my life to most people reads quite a bit like the endless summer. Anyways, I want to share some not so obvious ways in which starting this blog has changed my life.
Self Exploration: If there’s anything that blogging has done for me, it’s given me a great opportunity for self exploration. Yesterday I was interviewed by my friend Caroline, the founder of Reflectmylife who asked me what people who should do if they don’t know what they love or what their passion is. That turned out to be a challenging question for me because I don’t think there is a right answer. I think the key to that however is doing a good amount of self exploration or soul searching. I think writing, regardless of whether you do it on a blog or not is a great tool for soul searching. As Tony Robbins said “A Life Worth Living is a Life Worth Recording.”
Physical Health: I would say I’m probably in the best physical health of my entire life today. For a good amount of my 20’s I was a heavy drinker and I would even smoke cigarettes when I drank. I still enjoy going out with my friends and having drinks, but it’s definitely done in quite a bit more moderation. While the blog itself is not responsible for my physical health, since I tend to use my time in the water as means of creative thinking and coming up with content ideas, the blog has indirectly impacted my physical health in numerous ways.
Financial Awareness: I made many mistakes in my early 20’s . Managing my finances was definitely not my strong suit. Starting this blog has given me the discipline to not only embrace the one financial habit that will make a dramatic difference in your life, but to actually track my own financial growth. Since I’m sharing my ideas with the world about how to improve all these areas of your life, I think there’s a level of accountability that comes with being a blogger.
A Dream Job: About a month ago I wrote about how my blog has helped me with my day job. Up up until this last year, I’ve hated every job I’ve had. I never looked forward to going to work and was always looking for my escape from the 9 to 5. Today, things are really different. I actually have what many people would consider a dream job. I’m the editor in Chief of the Flightster Travel blog and I get to run all the social media marketing for an online travel site. I don’t really think of it as a job as much as I do yet another opportunity for creative expression that happens to come with a paycheck. As a byproduct of that I think I’m better at it than any job I’ve ever had.
A Global Network of Friends/Contacts: Bloggers are a truly a tribe and a community. If you look at a tribe, it’s members, and their subculture you will start to see that it is a beautiful thing. The people I’ve connected with online over the last year have been some of the most inspiring people I’ve ever met in my life. The great thing is that they are a like-minded group of people all trying to live their life to the fullest. Not only that, they are eager to see you live your life to the fullest. As you know you’re the byproduct of who you surround yourself with. Surround yourself with people who are living the lives of their dreams or are on their way there, and you will eventually become one.
Creative Expression: What motivates is often quite surprising. Many people don’t realize that money is actually not the most powerful motivator in getting us to reach our full potential. Don’t believe me? Read Dan Pink’s book Drive or Dan Arieli’s The Upside of Irrationality. It turns out we have a strong need for intrinsic benefits in things we do. When I encourage people to start blogging, I think they often get caught up in the idea that writing is the only form of blogging. But it doesn’t have to be.
- If you are an artists, put up your work on a blog
- If you are a musician, share your music, or teach us how to play
- If you are a cartoonist, put up your illustrations through a blog
- If you’re a video wiz, then make use your blog as a video platform
The truth is that it’s a platform for anything you want it to be.
Yaro Starak/Blog Mastermind: I know I’ve mentioned this to you before and you can even check out my recent interview with Yaro. I can honestly say that signing up for Blog Mastermind was one of the best investments I’ve made in my entire life. Everything you see today was a byproduct of that and I encourage you to take a look at Yaro’s Program, by click on the banner below. Even if you don’t sign up for the program, get on his newsletter and get his free ebook.
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{ 22 comments… read them below or add one }
This is really inspiring Srini and I was nodding my head all the way through – I can identify with so much of what you shared. It’s funny, there are so many things that I can see that have changed in my life since starting blogging a year ago, that I know are down to blogging.
It’s kind of crazy isn’t it? It seems so odd that something as simple as starting a blog could have such an impact on all these somewhat unrelated areas of your life. To me these things I’ve shared above have been some of the greatest benefits of blogging.
The one about creative expression, I can totally identify with. There is something really powerful in putting your thoughts, feelings and experiences into just the right words, and sharing them with potentially the whole world
Eduard @ People Skills Decoded´s last blog ..Why family pressure is heavy pressure and how to lighten the load
Eduard,
I agree. One thing I noticed in Dan Ariely’s book is the need we have for creative expression. Amazingly what fulfills people in jobs more than money is creative expression. I’ve been really lucky to get that from my job. It’s rarely about the face time but, about the opportunity to be creative.
Great post Srini! I especially like the idea that if you surround yourself with other people who are living their dreams or on their way to, you’ll get there too. I’ve been reading your blog and have become a huge fan of the Blogcast FM podcasts and they’ve really motivated me to work on my own thing. So thank you for that! Again, this post is pretty much spot on and I relate to it fully.
Susan´s last blog ..Truly Being Your True Self
Susan,
Thanks so much for your comments and ongoing support on BlogcastFM. BlogcastFM has been absolute joy for me and despite having a somewhat small audience, seeing that people are getting so much value out of it really has been amazing. Keep a look out in the next few days for our new design
Great insights. I happen to agree that you’re good at your current job.
Great to be around people who love what they do.
Shannon´s last blog ..House update – cabinets are painted!
Thanks Shannon
. Considering it’s people like you who are writing for the blog I run at work I can say you enable me to be good at my current job.
There’s a lot of great food for thought here. Thanks for sharing.
life in a pink fibro´s last blog ..Its never too early for a foot in the door
Thanks for the comments. I hope you’ll stick around for the party
I loved this post! My goal is that my blog opens up the ability to keep doing what I love too. I loved that you acknowledged the self exploration because sometimes even when I’m so frustrated with my days that I don’t want to do anything writing really helps, especially when you know that others are going to benefit from what you have to share.
Nunzio Bruno´s last blog ..Hows that plan going
Nunzio,
I’m amazed at how therapeutic writing this blog has been for me. I’ve learned so much about myself and what I really want. I think it’s one of the most phenomenal personal development tools.
I like this, very thought provoking. I think a blog has made me more disciplined, especially with time. Before blogging, although I was motivated and did a lot of writing, some for others, some just for me, it was unstructured and generally deadline free.
Now I consciously plan time to write posts and find the more I do, the more ideas I have. I thought I might run out of things to talk about but it seems not!
Kate
Kate´s last blog ..Lessons from Budapest – Slow Down and Take Note
The discipline with time is something I’ve also experienced. I think it forced your ability to manage time especially if you are juggling it with a regular day job and just life in general. As far as planning, I’ve gotten in the habit of turning on the computer and opening my writing software before I do anything else. Sometimes I’ll peck at the keyboard and nothing will come out. But for the most part, I can pump out content like a machine because of this.
You have highlighted some real true facts. I believe once you start a blog and dedicate your time to continuously updating it the real you 2.0 starts taking shape. You read what you should be reading, you participate where you were supposed to.
Also I believe a blog is a challenging business too, you have to put real value to attract what you want. End of the day it makes you hard working and more dedicated towards what you want to do in life.
Himanshu Chanda´s last blog ..How to hire great talent just for 1 buck!
Himanshu,
Very thought provoking points you made. I like the idea, of You 2.0 (sounds like a good title for a book). I think the idea of reading what you should be reading is really key. We start taking much more conscious control of everything in our live, especially the information we’re exposed to. Otherwise we just expose ourselves to a bunch of crap on a continuous basis.
I think I am on the process of self-exploration “with” my blog. I consider myself a neophyte blogger. I started writing about non-tech stuff in May of this year and decided to get serious about blogging (I’ve been a casual blogger writing tech stuff and I’ve been blogging on that since January of 2008, which remained “casual blog”). Earlier this month (2010), I officially launched my blog – and my journey to problogging has begun. I am discovering and rediscovering stuff. I don’t have yet a lot of traffic but it is always fulfilling to hear praises from friends and families. I am not really thinking, at this point, about what blogging could give me in the long run. Right now it’s just about me, my blog and the readers. If you’d ask me if I am expecting good things to come via my blog – I am now that I’ve read your post.
marlon @ productivity bits´s last blog ..How To Dig Yourself Out Of The Productivity Pit
Marlon
Just from your comments, I can tell that you have the right attitude about becoming a successful blogger. One of the things that causes most bloggers to fail is a lack of patience. Blogging is very much a long term investment and if you don’t stick it out for the longer term then there’s no payoff. I hope you’ll stick around the Skool of Life and I look forward to seeing your progress as a blogger. What’s great is you are tapped into a community of people who all want to see you succeed. Don’t forget that it wasn’t that long ago that most of us who have even semi-well known blogs were nobody.
I love the idea that we are recording everything Sri. We can look back when we are old and reminisce on the things we used to do. We can understand how we used to feel. That’s powerful!
Financial Samurai´s last blog ..The Four Different Ways To Spend Money By Milton Friedman
Sam,
I agree. It’s interesting to look at the progression of where you started and where you are today. Who knows maybe I”ll do a write up on my blogging path.
Great insights as usual, Srinirao. Thanks for giving us Skool Of Life. Your gift is appreciated. Always great to learn from one of the greats !
Clara.
Clara´s last blog ..Lessons Learned After Becoming A Single Working Parent!
Clara,
Thanks for such flattering comments. I’m not sure if I’d consider myself “one of the greats”. Just sharing my own experiences and hopefully people are inspired by them