What Makes a Good Blogger?

Quick note to my guest posters-I’m going to need your posts in the next few days! Thanks!

This a question I’ve been asking myself lately. What more could I or should I be offering you guys? I’ve come up with a few things.

1. Tackling the tougher issues. Frankly, I don’t really do this. Why? Maybe I’m afraid. I try to avoid controversy. Of the few posts I’ve attempting, I’ve tread very carefully. I’m scared of offending people. But with that fear, can I really be a “good” blogger? I get basically no negative comments on my blog. Which I guess is good, but maybe I should inject my opinions a little more? It’s not that I don’t have them. I suppose I’m just scared. I feel like things are mostly rainbows and sunshine over here on the blog. Which I’m fine with-when I started my blog, I wanted it to be a place for positivity. Specifically-I didn’t want it to be a place to beat myself up over food choices or body shame, so I’m happy about that. However, as my blog matures, some of the more serious topics should be tackled.

Why else might I not blog about these things? Maybe I’m young and naive. 

Maybe those serious topics don’t even cross my mind. I am a relatively young blogger. Or maybe I need to take a closer look at things instead of glossing over them, pretending all is as it should be. 

What else makes a good blogger?

I feel like most of the most popular healthy living bloggers have already arrived at health. They eat what they need for their bodies (both healthy and unhealthy foods, but in a balance that works for them). They have it all figured out. 

I certainly haven’t. 

I really thought I did though.

This time last year, I had the healthy thing all figured out. I felt like I had for a few years. But this past year…

I feel like my first year of college chewed me up and spit me out. It knocked me around and pushed me down, but now I’ve emerged once again, standing. 

I always thought I was a strong person, until this year. I feel like this past year broke me, but I’ll hopefully be a better person from it. 

My healthy habits that had been instilled in me for years vanished, masked by crew-my eating habits were bad but I exercised so much that of course I didn’t gain weight. 

But of course health isn’t it. Being in an environment with all new people, most of whom are freaking geniuses who are CEOs of their own successful start ups, or who have traveled the world making a difference, all at the ripe old age of 18. Classes were much more challenging that high school. I didn’t sleep. Eating was the last thing on my mind-except it wasn’t. I was focusing on my poor eating habits, just enough to stress me out, but not enough for me to make a change. Awesome. 

Winter quarter was dark-no sleep, high stress, poor school performance, crew stress-mentally and physically. Something was bound to break. And it did. I became the sickest I’ve been in my life, and then developed the worst eating habits of my life. 

Mono stripped my body of the nutrients it needed to function. After weeks of not being able to tolerate food, I ate. I just ate. My body craved food, desperately trying to restore itself. And that’s the story of how I managed to gain 20 pounds in just weeks. 

Spring quarter I’ve eaten worse than ever in my life-and gained weight faster than ever in my life. 4000 calories everyday will do that for you…

Also note-eating like a rower when you’re NOT a rower is not a good idea. 

Do I blame the mono for the weight gain? Yes. But it wasn’t the beginning of the disruption of my health-not at all. You know, I had been patting myself on the back all year for not gaining the freshman 15, not gaining my usual holiday weight. Hah. little did I know what was coming for me….

That is the story of how I lost my health, which I am still trying to find. I’ve definitely restored a lot of the balance, but the damage is done and it will take a lot of hard work. I do truly believe that the experience will be for the better in the long term. I am stronger now than I was a year ago. Sure, several pounds heavier, but stronger. Yeah, being sick was awful. Gaining weight was awful. Feeling like crap all the time was awful. But I learned so much about myself. I believe that I can now pick myself off the ground, and continue on. 

So do I qualify as a perfect healthy living blogger? No. The above-mentioned unravel occurred during the life of this blog. But the restitching will also occur on this blog. What falls apart can be put back together-it has to be. What’s life without a little journey? The bitter only makes the sweet even better. Life goes on. In 30 years, I want to look back on my illness and recognize it as a new beginning. Not the end of my healthy journey, but just a bump in the road, a fresh start. So do I have it all figured out? No! Maybe someday I will. Maybe not. That’s okay too. As long as each day I get one step closer, I’m happy. I have confidence in myself that I’ll figure things out. 

And when I do, I’ll make sure that my blog covers it. Because that’s the kind of blogger I am-not there yet, but someday. 

What makes a good blogger?