Mistakes on writing a blog

Starting is easier than keeping. Some time ago, I started creating my blog, but what was cool and pleasure became a hard-to-keep task, and little by little, I stopped posting. That is deadly for any blog.

As a Software Engineer, creating a blog was the best way I’ve found for sharing knowledge about React Native, entrepreneurship, and lifestyle. Looking backward, I can identify some points that drove me to stop posting, and if you want to keep consistency in writing, please consider avoiding some mistakes I’ve made.

Choose complexity instead of simplicity.

For creating a routine, it’s important to do One Thing and do it great. I didn’t realize it in the begging and what I did was create a very long project from the start point, sharing my experience by talking about a lot of pieces of the puzzle while solving it. Why did this approach become a problem? Because all the posts were connected, to have context about the current text was necessary to read the previous ones. If you want to share some experience/knowledge, do it in a manner the reader can get value in the current text or in the lightest possible way. Solve first, connect after, maybe in another post.

Use your blog as documentation.

You don’t need to create big/complex/fancy blog posts, I mean, sure that you can if you want but, sometimes the better audience for your post is yourself! A friend of mine always pushed me for writing. He used to say, write for yourself, as documentation. If you had a problem that has required effort to get solved, documenting how you solved it will save tons of re-work for your “your-future-self”. Keep in mind, the chances that other people face the same problem are huge! Help others, helping you.

• How did I solve <Some day-by-day problem>
• List of programs/apps I like to use, and why?
• How to setup this a specific tool
• Etc…

Just write, and post.

Put your thoughts down, write a small, simple text, but keep writing and posting. Maintaining a routine is essential to creating and habit. I speak for myself. Things went downhill from the moment I started skipping the writing and posting routine. Start with an easy-to-keep routine, posting once a week or once a fortnight, but once you have chosen the posting window, keep it. Sometimes ideas pop up in your mind, write them down and schedule the post for another day because you do not have to post right after writing! Enjoy the time of plenty because times of scarcity will come.

Try, learn, repeat.

As a new year resolution, I decided to start again. But this time doing things differently, based on my previous experience. I’ve learned a lot from posting, as well as helping me improve my English as it’s not my first language (tips & corrections are welcome). Sometimes we make mistakes, and it’s OK. But it is important to learn from your mistakes, aiming to improve based on your experiences. Don't fear starting again, there are no rules on that! I decided to give it my try!