Growing my Blog, Growing my Heart

Hey Folks! Do I start every other post with salutation now? Oh well, I like it! Today I want to address where I am with the blog right now, or basically, a little recap of where 6 months of blogging has gotten me.

First off, I started this blog in July 2012. I had just finished a Multimedia Composition for course where one of my assignments was to keep a blog over the semester. I had to update the blog at least once a week, sometimes more. I got to choose any topic of my choice, for which I chose healthy living. I posted about doing Insanity for the first time, recipes, grocery shopping, and stuff like that. It was fun, but more than that - my professor showed me that blogging is a real media that people make jobs out of. Being an English Writing major, I always knew I wanted to write but I never knew how. Blogging gave me the how. So after my wedding in June when I got back, I took the plunge started my very own blog.

The first four months of blogging (July-November) were pretty stale for me. I was only blogging an average of about 9 posts per month. I always had ideas in my head for blog posts, but few of them ever came to fruition (which is so sad. Sorry blog posts I never wrote!). I wanted it in my head, but my reality wasn't making much happen.

But in December - just last month - everything kind of changed. My passion for writing and turning my every day life into blog posts grew something fierce. At first, it felt like a lot of effort. How many times do I have to break out my camera and then import pictures onto my computer, and then edit them? Ugh. How many hours do I have to spend formatting stuff and proof-reading? How many posts will I have that have zero comments? Groan. (If you've blogged for any amount of time, please tell me you feel my pain.) But it was all worth it because by the end of December, I had blogged twice as much in one month as I had in the last four, and my page views for the month was almost as much as I had had in four months as well. I saw a huge jump.

Obviously, the more dedicated I am to the blog, the more visitors and comments I get. It's not a hard equation to figure out. But because that "equation" has shown me the results I have now, I'm overjoyed and even more excited about blogging. But besides posting more and getting the hang of the take pictures, format pictures, write post, publish post to social media rhythm, the biggest factor in becoming more successful with my blog has been connecting with you guys. Yes, I know this is not a novel concept. You read it on every blog post about how to grow your blog. But I just have to attest to the fact that that tip is so true. It's the number one thing anybody can do: just connect!

Where Social Media Comes In

In the staler months of my blog, I was reluctant to use social media to my advantage. I have been a social media scrooge for a while now, wanting to quit it altogether and such. But when I ultimately decided I needed social media merely to grow the blog, and I started using it like I should, that's when I stopped disliking social media and I started seeing real results and relationships form. Just in the past two weeks or so, I feel I have really connected with some fellow bloggers. And maybe it's not a big deal to anyone else (or maybe it is), but I seriously feel a part of my heart growing for these people I'm encountering.

An example of this love is from some tweets that really made me smile this week from Caroline at The Trendy Trainer and Kacie at Savvy Sassy Me. Caroline's tweet was in response to me saying I hope to grow my blog as big as some of the "big bloggers" someday. Too sweet. Thank you, ladies for the encouragement!

And as Kacie has said, just be yourself and you will find success. She posted a great post about being your self and how that simple idea has lead to her great success (yes, I think you are widly successful! Congrats on getting into Shape!). It's so simple and yet so many of us bloggers are kind of not ourselves because, well, this is the internet and it's scary, and what the heck is my blog supposed to be like anyway?! 

Anyway, with all this said, I just wanted to give a shout out to everyone I've been connecting with recently. Our connections mean a lot to me and I'm so glad to get to know other people doing what I do. And this list is in no particular order, it's just the order my bookmarks opened up ;)

• Danica @ It's Progression
• Kaite @ Gettin' My Healthy On
• Abbey @ Finding My Forever
• Emily @ Perfection Isn't Happy
• Melanie @ Happy Being Healthy
• Caroline @ The Trendy Trainer
• Kacie @ Savvy Sassy Me 
• Toronto Runner

I'm really excited about where this blog is going and how much it has the opporunity to grow - not only in terms of numbers and posts - but in terms of friends :) 

Daily Imperfection: Laziest, Longest Day Ever!

Today has been by far the laziest and yet longest day ever. Today was one of those days where both the hubs and I knew that we didn't really have anything to do, so we just slept in, stayed in, and made really poor food choices all day!

I was lucky enough to be graced with my husband's always-delicious cheesy eggs this morning, along with a whole wheat bagel thin, and a lot of coffee in my favorite little festive mug. The rest of what I ate today can basically be left unsaid because I either don't remember or I do remember and I don't want to talk about it ;)

An Accidental Double Batch

Something the hubs and I have been munching on are these amazing cookies. The recipe is from Julie at Peanut Butter Fingers. They're called chocolate peppermint pudding cookies. Sound amazing? They are sooo good! I love chocolate, peppermint, and pudding, so this is a perfect cookie for me. There's peppermint pieces in the cookies which makes for a fun crunch and a pretty look to these sweets. This is definitely a great choice for a cookie exchange or for eating for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Seriously... I cannot resist, and these things will probably be gone before the weekend is over.

The funny thing about these cookies though is that when I was making them, I accidentally dumped the whole packet of pudding mix into all the ingredients when it only called for half. Whoops! Immediately I knew I messed up the cookies as they were too dry and less pepperminty than I expected them. I freaked out, thinking I ruined the cookies I so eagerly wanted to bake, but my husband of course is smarter and less panic-y than I. Since I doubled the pudding mix, he suggested we double the whole recipe (aka the rest of the ingredients, so it all matched). And of course, that worked out perfectly, and - oh, darn - I ended up with a double batch of these suckers ;) Funny how the imperfections tend to work out in our favor (or not, if you're counting calories, but don't even go there with me this weekend).

Another Layout! 

Anyway, as you can see, I redid the blog layout again. The last one was just not working for me in certain aspects. Long story, but it's redone yet again. But I love it this time! It's completely different, fresh, and much more functional than the last one. Let's just say that I couldn't get the last one to be "perfect." When it comes to layout stuff, it's really hard for me to not expect perfection since I can technically manipulate everything in a layout. But I'm not that good with HTML, so I ended up messing things up and making it look worse in certain cases instead of better. Either way, after literally a whole day of bumming around on my compter, this layout seems to be working very well for me. And no, it's not perfect either, but it's a whole lot better.

Something to think about today: what areas of your life do you think you can actually attain perfection, such as my blog layout fiasco? Are you expectations realistic or will they lead you no where? 

What's Stealing your Joy? Part I: Social Media & Other Things that Waste our Time

Let's just start with this: I have been dying to write about social media for quite some time. This year, I seemed to have really seen through the facade that social media is, and yet also used social media myself more than ever before. Social media is the new everything. Every business and person these days is using social media to reach as many people as they can. Yeah, it's the "wave of the future," but it's also making me really unhappy.

Have you ever thought about it? Please take a moment to assess your relationship with social media. I'll wait. Think about how much time you spend on social media either wasting time or procrastinating/avoiding things you really could be doing. Think about how the things you see on social media make you feel. Another person engaged? Another ten pins about so-and-so's wedding. [Insert negative feeling here]. How many times does your phone beep at a new like on Facebook or tweet from your bff? Maybe you don't feel as annoyed by social media as I do, but taking the time to assess our relationship to the media we expose ourselves to is worth some serious thought. I personally feel that social media is relentlessly pursuing us - day and night, night and day. Did you ever stop to think if you wanted a relationship with social media in the first place?

My Personal Social Media Battle 

Personally, social media gives me a little anxiety. All this info about myself out there for who knows to see. Kind of weird. But our culture pushes social media so hard. It's the only way to stay connected! Everyone else has it. Oh, you don't have this new app yet? You better get it! Relentless. And this is where the joy stealing comes in to play. Social media is pushed on us so heavily that we're almost forced to get whatever the latest thing is. But what if I don't want yet another app or another thing to check? Too bad - you're a total weirdo if you don't have Facebook nowadays. And if you have it, you better be checking it all the time. "You didn't see that on Facebook yet?" We've all had one of those comments thrown our way, as if we should feel guilty for not letting our news feed be our homepages. But enough ranting, let's get to the question of why social media can steal joy.

Why Social Media Steals Joy 

1. Habit. You have to constantly check it or it constantly reminds you to check it. This is just another thing to do. This kind of task doesn't get put on a to do list, though. It just happens. It becomes a habit, and probably one you never wanted to have.

2. Facade. It's a false view of reality. Most of the time, anything on Facebook is everyone's best. No one updates their status with "I'm so anxious today" or "I hate how all my clothes look on me right now." No one is going to be that honest with such a large audience, usually. People show their best and hide their worst. But you're usually left comparing your worst or how you really feel to everyone else's best. It's a completely skewed vision of your friends and the world around you.

3. Bragging Rights. Along with the last one, social media is now basically a socially acceptable way to brag. You got a new hair cut? Instagram it. You got a new car? Put photos of it on Facebook. You're getting married? Better pin ten new wedding planning ideas to Pinterest, stat! No, there's nothing wrong with using social media as it was intended, but you know that some people take it too far.

4. Wastes Time. I never use social media, and then when I'm done say, "That was time well spent" (okay, unless it's Pinterest, but that's just because Pinterest fools us into thinking we actually "did" something). There's so much information online that it's hard if not impossible to catch up with it all again. You can just keep clicking to your heart's content forever, if you let yourself. There's always something new and with so many new social media apps and websites being introduced, there's always more to check and thus waste your time.

5. Self-focused. While Facebook and Twitter certainly do have capabilities to interact with others, the majority of the way these platforms are used is for thy self. Facebook's status bar always has the question "What's on your mind?", as if everyone you're friends with really needs or wants to know. Ultimately, social media, whether I want to admit it or not, has turned into "all about me" things instead of connecting with people. It's more about what you can show others, not the other way around.

Obviously, this is a pessimistic view of social media, but to be honest, social media has gotten me pretty down lately. As a person trying to live intentionally - setting goals, using my time wisely, not worrying, being self-controlled - I find social media counteracting my personal goals. I've unfortunately felt like (since working on this post for a while now) that social media is something that we can't live with or without. I feel even more tugged in two directions as a blogger. If I want my blog to grow and succeed, social media literally IS the only way to do that now! Yes, there are many ways to get blog traffic, but read any recent article on how to direct more traffic to your blog, and social media is at the top. Anyway, it's hard to think I want to unplug and be done with this nonsense when our culture is driven by technology and social influences. I've considered writing off all online everything altogether, besides my email I guess, but then I feel that I would be left in the dark - not about people's lives but with up and coming technology.

Finding the Balance 

For now, the balance remains up to me. I have the power to say no to any social network or app that I don't want to be a part of. It's easy to feel like if everyone else has it that you too must partake. But do you remember life before Facebook or, dare I say, MySpace? I hardly do since I was quite young when these networks came around, but yes - there was life before Facebook and Twitter and even Pinterest! People lived without social media for years, and probably much happier than our addicted-to-being-online culture does now. The balance rests in my hands, sometimes literally. My phone is always at my finger tips. My laptop flicks on as soon as I open it. Social media is always waiting, but you don't have to be. There are a lot of ways to limit your use of social media. I could probably write a whole other post about that! But some simple things I've learned is to turn off notifications on my phone for pretty much everything, or I'm just glued to it as soon as it beeps. I try to have "phone-free" time and limit my time mindlessly using my computer. Just remembering that I am in control and things don't control me brings back my sense of joy that I so long to have.

How do you feel about social media? Does it ever feel like it's taking over your life or do you have a pretty good grip on your daily dose of social?

For the love of Blog

Time goes by, the coffee gets cold, the weather changes, and before I know it... I've forgotten about my blog. The other day, I was at a friend's Labor Day barbecue when someone actually asked me about my blog in conversation. Wait, what? You know about my blog?! I thought. It was a first for me. And yet, it sadly came as a surprise that, yes, people are reading this sentence right now. It's on the internet after all! I responded by saying, "Oh yeah, I kind of blog... only about once a week, though." And my husband immediately popped up and said, "Once a week! That's still a big deal!" And he's right.

In my heart, I have high hopes. I know I want to write for a living. I know I want to wake up every day and do something I am passionate about. I know I don't want to write memos and copy letters for some boring company, if I could even get into writing. And I don't want to settle for something other than my dreams. My dream is to write, but yet here is my writing, for all to see, like it's a reality... And maybe if I just worked on that dream, it would start to feel like reality to me instead of like a failed high school science experiment, exploding in my face every time it doesn't feel perfect.

There are so many other successful bloggers out there. I have bookmarked nearly 50 blogs recently, with the intent of studying their posts, their content, their layout and design, all in order to get ideas for my blog, and to see how they became successful. But in the midst of this looking and yearning to learn, I become discouraged like the perfectionist I am. How can I ever get there? Having that kind of blog is sooo far away for me right now. Or is it?

For the love of my blog, I hope to actually make Freeing Imperfections a home for my writing. This isn't just a home for nothing, a space taken up for my entertainment. It's my blog. Anyone with a successful blog certainly loves their blog, right? So why am I not loving mine?

Well, here's a few reasons...

- I over-think my audience. Too often I think, does someone really want to read that?

- I under-post. This is directly correlated with over-thinking my audience. I convince myself no one will want to read it, so I don't even attempt to write anything at all, leaving me with one blog post a week - not truly enough to drive traffic.

- I'm afraid. I'm afraid of revealing too much of myself on the internet. I'm afraid of making a wrong step. It's a scary world out there.

- I've drastically reduced the time I spend on the internet recently. Too often, I find my time being wasted on Facebook and Pinterest. While I am still pretty addicted to Pinterest when I allow myself to be on it, I am slowly gravitating away from the computer to use my time better. But the only way to blog is at the computer!

Overall, I just want to say that I do love my blog. This is my place to write, to feel free, to be creative, to find meaning... And now's the time to own up to doing what I love most: writing! Here's to more blog posts and a better attitude about blogging in general!

Fellow bloggers, can you relate to any of this? What is keeping you from blogging the way you want or having the blog you want?

Unlinking Blogger from Google+

Normally, I wouldn't opt for posting about blogging stuff, but this is a big deal for me. When I signed up for Blogger, I apparently already had a Google+ account set up because of my Gmail account (which I never use, so I had no idea how to use Google+). When you sign up for Google+ or Gmail, you need your full name. Since my Blogger account was opened with a Google+ account, my Blogger profile showed my full name and thus, my posts on the blog showed my full name too, which I seriously did not like!

I was able to figure out how to get my posts not to show my full name, but if I wanted to comment on the blog or other blogs using my Blogger profile, my full name was shown. So that wasn't really that helpful! Anyway, today I finally figured out how to remove my full name from Blogger! It was really really simple. I just didn't know where to look.

To remove your full name from your Blogger posts and unlink your Google+ account from Blogger:

1. Go to your Blogger Dashboard Homepage.

2. On the left hand side, click the little wheel at the top of the screen (Blogger Options).

3. Click "Revert to Blogger Profile." (as shown in picture)

4. On the following screen, click "Switch to a limited Blogger profile."

5. Confirm your profile and set your new username. This will be the display name for your blog posts and comments across Blogger. I set mine to "Melissa (Freeing Iperfections)."

6. Voila! Enjoy blogging without your last name!

This is obviously not rocket science, but I had been stumped by this annoyance for weeks now. I searched and nothing came up. But now I know. Hope this helps someone out there!