Why have a blog?

Anyone only interested in year abroad things rather than blogging, feel free to close this tab!

I'd just like to do a quick post / rant about blogging. Mainly to get it out of my system (which, as you'll see, is one of the reasons I blog).

I have absolutely no problem with the new phenomenon that is earning money through blogging. In fact, I think it's great. Why not make money from something creative and inspiring? 

I've learned a million things over the years through blogs and Youtube, whether it's info and recommendations of places to travel, beauty tips, people's personal experiences or just admiration of beautiful photos, I think blogs are great.

The same goes for Youtube. I myself used to (and still sometimes do) post covers of songs on Youtube; it's somewhere for me to document them and see how I improve (if at all!) over time, and to get immediate feedback from people other than your biased family and friends. I've also seen some amazing artists make a career from what started as them sitting in their bedroom. To name a few examples - Lewis Watson, Gabrielle Aplin, Lauren Aquilina, Orla Gartland, Nina Nesbitt.

Recently, on Bloglovin, (I realise this doesn't seem to link but it will soon, I promise!) the 'popular' section seems to be filled with posts on how to 'grow' your blog or have a 'successful' blog, and for some reason it's really irritating me. For example, at the moment I can see '10 blog posts you should read about blogging', '5 ways to up your blogging game', 'Blogging, a few things to remember', 'How we can all write better blog posts', 'Tips and advice for upgrading your blog' ... I could go on.

Maybe it's just me, and maybe some people find these posts useful, but I personally find them annoying and almost patronising. What happened to people just...blogging? Instead of talking about how to blog all the time. Surely the more people take these bits of 'advice', the more blogs will become similar to each other, lose originality and individuality and therefore become boring and probably less likely to be 'successful'? And why should we be made to feel we have to aim to make our blog successful anyway?

My point is, the blogs and Youtube channels that do well (in terms of gaining a big audience and earning money) will do well no matter what, because usually the person behind them has passion for what they are doing and has probably had a bit of luck too. I bet 98% of them didn't set up their blog or channel with the aim of earning money at the end. It just annoys me that this is what blogs are now encouraging 'new bloggers' to do, as if we're all interviewing for a job role or something.

For me, my blog is to share with people my experiences of a year abroad, the things I learn or the thoughts I have about it. Although this one is aimed to be specifically about the year abroad, I'm not going to punish myself for writing about different things, e.g. right now! And if I set up a new blog once I've finished my year abroad, it will be for the same purposes, and will simply be a place to document things in my life and my thoughts, or get things off my chest. I just personally think anyone setting up a blog with the aim of earning money from it is not doing it for the best/right reason.

I'm not sure what I'm getting at really because my annoyance is only directed at a handful of blog posts, but I suppose I'm just voicing my opinion that I think it's silly to suggest advice on how to have a 'successful' blog. I was even going to link a post I found interesting, in which a blogger asked other bloggers what they thought a 'successful blog' was. They all gave very similar and in my opinion great answers, about how success is personal and it comes from passion etc. but then I noticed the same writer had done a post on 'finding your blogging niche', which unfortunately kind of proves my point!

I'm interested to know other thoughts on this (feel free to disagree with me!); would you like to earn money from blogging? Do you think it's a positive thing that people can blog full-time as a job?

(Sorry to rant on a Sunday.)