Welcome to my blogoversary celebration! For the next ELEVEN days, I’ll be sharing guest posts with a huge giveaway on the last day after a post shared by me. Keep track of all the posts in order to enter the huge giveaway at the end!
This 8th post is by the lovely Nikki over at There Were Books Involved! Read to see her thoughts on the topic of the week: how blogging has changed her life!
First off, I want to wish a SUPER-HAPPY AND WONDERFUL-THINGS-FILLED BLOGOVERSARY to the amazing Shelly!!! *raises glass* Here’s to another year of awesomeness!
*ahem* Now back to your regularly-scheduled guest post. 😉
So Shelly has asked me to talk a little bit about how I discovered blogging, and/or how blogging has changed me. As to the first part… honestly? I don’t even remember discovering the book blogosphere. I used to have a personal blog on LiveJournal; and, while I let that die a slow death, I did stay active on Twitter and Goodreads, so it must have been through one of those that I first discovered the book blogosphere. However, it wasn’t until I was able to attend the ALA Midwinter convention in Seattle in January 2013, when I finally started to think about starting my OWN book blog. I’d viewed the book-blogging community as this untouchable, awesome place filled with intense, hardcore readers – did I want that responsibility? I posted some little reviews on Goodreads, wasn’t that enough for me??? But it wasn’t really until ALAMW that I realized… those people at that convention were my people, and I couldn’t afford to stay away. 😉 So I’ll admit, I sort of stalked the blogging community for a while, to see how things were being done, and finally, in March, I decided I was ready. And I haven’t looked back.
I honestly feel like starting my blog was one of the best decisions I’ve made in my life. That might sound a little dramatic, but I think if you’re a part of the blogging community, you’ll understand. It’s just so fulfilling to share something you love (like, really love) with other people who love the same thing. But other than the amazing community (yes, I’m getting to the second part of Shelly’s question!), the best thing about blogging is what it has done for my own personal happiness and, most importantly, confidence. Hobbies are supposed to be fun, so the happiness thing makes sense (though we all are familiar with the dreaded book-slump and blogging-burnout). But the confidence thing… that was something I really didn’t expect.
I’m a super shy and extremely introverted person to begin with, and I’m sure – all the minutes and hours added up – I’ve spent many months of my life by myself, reading books. But I used to be really bad at talking to people about books… Or, at least, I know I always came across as apologetic and sort of subdued, because many of my friends (IRL friends) didn’t know or care what YA was, or they didn’t like reading Sci-Fi/Fantasy, or they just didn’t like reading for fun at all. They didn’t Get It, you know? I think there’s something to be said for building confidence by being a part of a community of like-minded people. It’s still an ongoing process, but my confidence has grown so much since I joined the blogging community. Not just in talking (and gushing) IRL about the books I love, but also just my personal confidence. Maybe that has to do with having such a good time, and having an “excuse” to spend a huge amount of time doing something I love (reading and blogging!). But I think it also comes from knowing that I’ve found so many amazing friends thanks to blogging. People who I know are my people, and who Get It, and who know that, no matter what we read, we are all readers – and that’s pretty awesome. That give me a huge amount of confidence. And I’m so thankful for that…
…and for bloggers like Shelly, because she is most definitely one of my people, and amazing, and I’m just so excited that it’s her blogoversary!! (Yeah, you see how I brought that full-circle? Totally intentional. Yep.)
So, here’s to Shelly – I’m sure the coming year will be filled with tons of books, good and bad and in-between, but I also know it will be filled with tons of amazing friends and fun times and unapologetic book-loving. So here’s wishing you those things, and much more. 😉 ❤
I have to say it: that post was so great! I’m not sure if the full circle was completely intentional but awww *hugs*
Stay tuned tomorrow for another lovely post!
