Dear Book Bloggers, I’m worried about you
Posted October 23, 2018
on:.
Dear book bloggers of the world: I’m worried about you.
Yes you, the blogger who said on their “about me” page that they’d being posting 3 book reviews a week, and a month in you’re already starting to get burned out because you’ve been reading 26 hours a day and have barely slept or walked your dog or done your homework or texted your mom or spent any time with your best friend.
And you, the book blogger who clicked on so much shiny cover art that now you have 50 NetGalley eARCs you need to read, like, right now because you need to make sure NetGalley always loves you.
And you, the book blogger who decided ten reading challenges look fun, and you thought reading 100 books this year was a worthy goal (and don’t forget the bingo card!), and then college started up again, you got diagnosed with a chronic illness, you moved cross country, you had to give your cat away, and now you are wondering how are you ever going to meet your goal of reading 100 books this year?
And you, the book blogger who feels like you’re doing it wrong because you think someone else’s book blog is shinier or sleeker, or longer, or shorter, or whatever-er than yours.
Dear book bloggers of the world: I’m worried about you. Please be kinder to yourselves.
Book blogging is not and was never meant to be something you are required to do every day or three times a week or on any arbitrarily defined schedule.
Book blogging is not and should not be about keeping up with other bloggers. There isn’t some prize for reading the most books, or downloading the most eARCs from Netgalley or getting the most ARCs in the mail.
Book blogging should not be something that comes before selfcare, or before your family, or before the big things in your life. Some days watching TV should come before book blogging, because we all do #selfcare differently.
Book blogging should not be something that causes you stress or strife or causes you to be judgemental about yourself.
Netgalley will understand. They know we love clicking on beautiful cover art.
Book bloggers of the world, please be kinder to yourselves.
Please, be take some time to be selfish. Take some time to realize that you have taken your passion for reading, the spark you carry inside you, and allowed it to blossom on a website that is all your own. With a little bit of clicking, and a little bit of html, you have literally created something out of nothing. You have created something that is completely unique to you – someone else, if given the same exact recipe, could never have made what you have made. Because of you, someone discovered a new-to-them book. Your passion, your spark, it rubs off on everyone who visits your site!
Still looking for the magic bullet of how win at blogging? Ok, here you go:
Being the bloggeriest blogger who ever blogged is not winning. Winning is showing up. Winning is being your authentic self. Winning is talking about books you care about, books that make you think, or cry, or laugh, or grow. Winning is coming to the bloggish community as you, not as who you think we want to meet. Winning is recognizing burn-out for what it is, taking a break when you need to, and keeping it fun.
Blog when you feel like it. Blog on a schedule that works for you. If you have a schedule that was working, and it isn’t working anymore, change it. Blogs are not made of stone and neither are you. Your blog works for you, not the other way around.
#selfcare comes first. Your health and your family come first. Take a break if that’s what life calls for. Your blog will still be here waiting for you when you come back. The blogging community will still be here waiting for you when you’re ready to return. We’re patient and we want you to take care of yourself. If you decide there isn’t room in your life for the commitment of blogging right now? That’s OK too. Really, it is!
Please do not think you are failing as a blogger because your blog isn’t as sparkly or as polka-dotty or as whatever-y as someone else’s.
The only failed blogger is the blogger who never started a blog in the first place.
Book bloggers of the world, please be kinder to yourselves. If the spark inside you burns out, the blogosphere will be all the poorer without you.
29 Responses to "Dear Book Bloggers, I’m worried about you"
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1 | Alex Kourvo
October 23, 2018 at 9:55 pm
I hear you! I cut down to once a month on the Writing Slices blog. Twelve reviews a year doesn’t seem like much, but I have to remember that those are twelve reviews that otherwise wouldn’t exist, and some is better than none.
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