Originally posted at: http://www.mindbodysouldeveloper.com/2017/03/16/will-suck-blogging-thats-ok/
This is an addendum to what was posted here by Pablo. It started as my response in his comments section. But my response was too long. I decided to write a separate blog post instead.
Pablo has many excellent points. Here's a short story about how I got good at blogging. And so can you!
Brief Background
I've been blogging at MindBodySoulDeveloper.com for almost two years as of this post.
This doesn't make me an expert!
It means I've spent more time writing blog posts than others. That's all.
I've been a software developer for over 10 years.
This doesn't make me an expert!
It means I've spent more time writing code than others. That's all.
You will suck at blogging, but that's OK.
Story time
My first project was in VB.NET (yay, VB...no, not really). I was fresh, young and pretty damn cocky.
It was an assignment for what you call a "BootCamp" now-a-days.
We had two or three days to finish the coding assignment. I finished it in a day and a half. I was cruising, browsing the internet. I was making fun of my other classmates because they were sweating bullets.
What's the big deal? It's a very easy assignment!
I thought to myself.
The day the assignment was due, I asked the guy next to me to revise it. He saw a glaring flaw.
I was using public variable fields
My program broke all over the place. Now, I was the one sweating bullets while others were done.
I pulled an all-nighter and got a decent grade. But never forgot how much I sucked at writing code and my lack of OOP knowledge.
Today, it's a different story.
Blogging
I had a similar story with blogging. But it was not as extreme.
My first blog post took me 4 hours to write. This doesn't count editing.
I didn't hit publish until around 2am.
I was being a perfectionist. I was scared of being criticize or ridiculed. The pictures had to be right. What if someone found a typo? Oh noes!
Guess what?
No one has wasted their time to troll me. Not one soul!
Actually, I've gotten some real positive and encouraging feedback from other fellow developers.
How do you get better?
Practice even when you don't seem to be getting nowhere.
~ George Leonard - Mastery
Today, I don't write public variables (or VB.NET, thank god!).
Public properties are muscle memory. My knowledge/experience in software development is much bigger than my fresh, younger, and cocky (aka arrogant) self.
It took me around 25 minutes to write down (this) my first official blog post in dev.to. Not bad compared to my first blog post that took me 4 hours to write.
There is no short-cut. No silver bullet.
Want to be a coder? Code.
Want to write/blog? Write/blog.
What are you waiting for? Write! :)
Originally posted at: http://www.mindbodysouldeveloper.com/2017/03/18/lower-your-expectations-when-blogging/
Uh. Yes. I've been blogging for 16 years, every single day... and i'm still learning things...! i've been a software developer for a bit longer though.
Just execute. Execute. Execute... and continue to experiment. Here's an experiment that just passed 2 years: 2 Years, 9K Posts, 7M Views.
Yes! I continue to learn as well.
Ty for confirming that all it takes is execution. All starts with that first step. Who know maybe someone reading this will be the next person to write the 2yrs, 9k posts, 7m views.
Congrats on all that hard work. But most importantly the time you invested! /bow
Awesome blog post.. I recently found out Cunningham's Law (yesterday) and that alongside is changing my approach to blogging. Thanks
I've heard of this before. But a good strategy. I've seen plenty of blog posts where the meat is in the content ( hopefully author updates content and gives credit ).
Good luck on your blogging adventure!
I agree with you. The only thing that can stop you is yourself. Overthinking is an obstacle.
This is typical of a software developer (aka over engineering). We solve so many hard problems that we forget how to solve simple ones.
I still struggle with this after all these years of blogging. It gets better. Promise.
Yes, practice and patience! I recently started a blog about my journey into software and it has been extremely rewarding for myself, so thank you for the inspiration!
I have a practical question though: How do you deal with outdated posts? I want them to stay around and show how things evolve, but not have old/broken code on the site either. I have only been writing for a few. months, but I expert the problem to arise sooner or later. Any practical tips on how to approach or think about this?