Words

A useless blog post

Annette45 Comments

This is a useless blog post. 

You will be no wiser about the world once you’ve read it. 

You will not have 7 new ways to fold a fitted sheet and 9 rainy day craft activities to pin or bookmark. 

You won’t learn an interesting anecdote about the French, or whether saying namaste is totally off limits to white folks. 

This post is inspired by this post written a few days ago by longtime blogger and rad resident of Melbourne town, Stacey from Veggie Mama. Stacey expresses what I think a lot of people feel, when they get creatively constipated. 

The best way to understand why I’m writing this and why Bron wrote this post and Allison wrote this post is to start by reading Stacey’s post. 

I’ll wait. 

Pours a cuppa. 

It sucks right? To lose your mojo. To feel deflated and a bit cynical/sad about something that used to bring you joy. 

In blogging (and in many other realms), you can get constantly bombarded and bamboozled by the latest strategies and tips on growing your readership, reaching new eyes, turning readers into raving fans, 78 ways to get a book deal and make money from your blog, how blogging can open up doors for you to RULE THE WORLD and defy death… okay maybe not defy death, but sheesh, it’s exhausting. 

The crux of a lot of blogger breakdown seems to fall under the immense, yet hard to define goal of “being useful”. 

Do you want to be a great blogger?    BE USEFUL.

Solve a problem, real or imagined. 

Now, on one level that is pretty sound advice, people want to get something from reading a blog, right?

But the word “useful” just grinds my gears, and a lot of other people’s it seems, because it seems, well, so, sales-y. 

So I offer this useless post to you, on a day where I’ve done little that you’d describe as useful, aside from a few loads of laundry. 

Sometimes blogging feels like this

I have listened to birds chirping and felt the sun on my face. Useless, right? 

I’ve painted and sketched. Useless pursuits. 

I have eaten bananas on toast and polished off half a box of savoury shapes. What a “waste” of calories! 

I’ve listened to a pointless podcast. 

I spent a few hours reading a book. 

I’ve even read a few useless blog posts, and now I’m writing one. 

Why? 

Because I think blogging is about something much more fundamental than usefulness. 

I think blogging is about connecting, about having a virtual chat with someone, about ‘huh, me too’ moments and most of all, to get away from all the sales-y, more crap to bookmark and never read, or any of the 12 more ways to feel inadequate about your style/weight/relationship/career/parenting posts we are bombarded with night and day. 

Of course, those posts are never titled so negatively, because they’re being useful and useful is upbeat and shiny, so it’s all 12 ways to love your kids more or 12 affordable date night ideas or 12 new ways with quinoa. 

Some of these posts pop up occasionally on blogs I read and love, BUT when a blogger churns out SHINY, USEFUL content day after day after day, my eyes glaze over and I stop reading those blogs. To me, there’s no soul in endlessly useful content. I don’t want useful information, I want to connect with the person doing the writing. If I want to know about quinoa I head to taste.com.au – quinoa’s covered. 

After reading Stacey’s post, I commented on her blog (yes, people still do that) and I very eloquently shared my response to her words… fuck useful. 

In writing this, I’m not having a go at people who are trying to help bloggers succeed, I’m simply saying that I think “success” comes in many guises, and if your blog has tumbleweeds blowing through it, maybe it’s time to revisit just writing stuff and pressing publish.  

But you won’t find any links to 6 ways to get your blogging mojo back posts here, this post is useless remember? 

I love bloggers. I’m looking at you Stacey. 

Uselessly, and hashtagging the shit out of it #uselessblogger 

 

Annette x 

 

45 thoughts on “A useless blog post”

  1. I love to just write and hit publish! It’s my favourite type of blog post, because it takes me somewhere I haven’t planned, somewhere authentic, somewhere I wanna hang.
    I love your useless post.
    So, yeah! Fuck useful! Two brilliant words to put together.
    Your day sounds lovely. X

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  2. Brilliant! After reading Veggie Mama’s post yesterday I knew it was time to blow the cobwebs out of my blog and just damn write something……not super polished or even on point, just do it! So glad I did šŸ˜ƒšŸ‘ I enjoy reading blogs for the nosey little insight into their life, not to be sold on something, but just to feel connected.

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  3. Great post! Excellent reminder of the WHY We blog. For me, since Jan 2015 my theme is:
    I blog to connect!
    Once I let go of what so-called experts said & more, I became me, blogger who connects each day with my readers. Some visit to read & others also comment! They “make my day”
    D x

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  4. Do you think it’s our weird “busy” thing that’s at the crux of it all? If we’re useless, are we doing that sin of all sins “wasting time”. I know that time “wasting” makes me feel oddly guilty. I feel bad!! BUT, reading this and all the #uselessblogger posts is utterly liberating. What a silly world we live in. I can totally go with this!!! x

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    • It is a silly world sometimes isn’t it?

      I don’t suffer from busy or guilty syndrome, thankfully. What a nightmare! I think there’s something very telling about being able to be un-busy, to choose not to be in the thick of things. It is definitely something I’ve grown into over the years, being able to value sleeping in, working, playing, and sky gazing – they’re all valid.

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  5. Bugger, I really want to know how to fold a pesky fitted sheet, I currently just roll ’em up!
    I have been saying namaste at the end of yoga for countless years, to mainly white people. Bugger.
    I didn’t read any more….. Ha just kidding, of course I read, and I agree, useless is a groovy and sometimes entertaining thing. Not everything and everyone needs solving. x

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    • You’re in trouble lady!! šŸ˜‚šŸ˜‚šŸ˜‚šŸ˜‚ I like occasionally useful things, not “how to live your best life” every single day. Chillax people.

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  6. I love you! I love Stacey and I just love that you have written this! Thank you, so gonna jump on. Today is my day off the real job, and I wasn’t going to open the macbook, and yet here we are. LouisaG long lost mojo, I’m saying fuck it and just going for it!

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  8. Love it Annette. I went to a blogging conference 2 years ago & pretty much stopped blogging. Felt inadequate & lost my mojo. Love the #uselessblogging niche hehe

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    • That’s the thing isn’t it? All the information coming at us, 42 tips for usefulness and the 57 how-to sessions and seminars you can sign up for everyday can totally overwhelm people. It actually does the exact opposite of what’s intended.

      Rock on useless bloggers!!

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  12. Epic post. I love those huh me too moments also. Here’s to writing from the heart and for writing just because. What one person thinks is useless could be quite the opposite to someone else.

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    • Exactly Renee. Yes to writing from the heart, from just because, from I need to write through these thoughts to see where I land, and for writing in the hope that someone, somewhere knows what we are feeling too. That’s useful!

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  14. with everything in life including a blog post! … useless to someone, is useful to someone else!
    authenticity wins and a sense of connection!
    I subscribe to veggie muma and she is great!
    we are too hard on ourselves! there will be good and bad days! that’s life! … and what one does and writes on their own blog is their business!
    I find good bad and silly and it’s all in the mix!
    thanks guys! you rock! … love m:)X

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  15. I think uselessness is what it’s all about. If there is anything useful to be found in my blog then that is a happy accident. Sometimes I think I should be posting something useful because otherwise why would people read it. But then I remind myself that I started my blog really just to act as a journal for myself, to have some sort of record of what I’m up to. If it opens up connections to others that is fab but at its core it’s as useful, and useless, as that.

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  16. In the spirit of solving an imagined problem, I offer this gem advice:

    In order to sort your llamas efficiently, you must first fix the anti-gravity device.

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  17. I solve problems sometimes, and ramble other times. It’s a useful/useless mix that leans towards the useless. And I’m not okay with Savoury Shapes, but I can smash a box of Barbecue in seconds. x

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  18. Annette – thank you for this post! I’m new to the blogging world and still trying to find my way. Now that I’m here, I’m blown away but the overwhelming amount of advice about how to be good at it! Oh my! I just wanted to write about some stuff that I learned that week that resonated with me as a working mom trying to keep a sense of self…….. Thank you for telling me it’s okay to write just for the sake of writing, and maybe something I put out there into the universe is going to resonate with someone else. I shouldn’t lose focus of why I started this in the first place. Keep doing what you do Annette…..I really look forward to your posts!

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    • Hey Kelly, stay true to that initial desire to write and connect. The rest, if it is what you’re after and if it comes, is all gravy. Thank you so much for commenting, that’s what I love most about blogging, making connections.

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  20. *stands up and claps wildly*

    I’m a useless blogger!

    Shiiit. I was told for a LONG time that because I had no niche I’d never be successful as a blogger. I’m not a mom, not a crafter or DIYer, not a foodie and I don’t write how to posts (unless they’re sarcastic and snarky that is). Because of that, apparently I’m useless as a blogger. I’ve finally learned to say SCREW YOU and flip the bird at bloggers like that. I got fed up with the snobbery. These days I do my own thing and if people don’t like it they can bugger off.

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