My first post was all about how I went from a social net­work­ing naysayer to an all-in, Face­book­ing Twit of a Blog­ger.  Now that I am very sea­soned, with a grand total of 8 posts, I think I am qual­i­fied to give just one tip.  So here it is, a tip from a begin­ning blogger…

How to Over­come the Fear That You Have Noth­ing of Value to Say

When I con­sid­ered start­ing my blog, my biggest hes­i­ta­tion was the dif­fi­culty of com­ing up with some­thing of value to write about each and every week.  What in the heck could I have to say that would mat­ter to people? 

I decided to sit down and write out a list of pos­si­ble top­ics to get me started.  In my first hour of doing this, I came up with 57 top­ics.  Then I asked two of my team mem­bers to help me add to the list.  I asked them to help me rec­ol­lect some of the things that I have repeated often, trained oth­ers on, strug­gled with and cel­e­brated.  Within 30 min­utes my list climbed to 97 topics. 

This really helped me to jump into blog­ging.  No more fear of hav­ing to sit there and con­trive some­thing insight­ful and valu­able to say each and every week.  I had a list of top­ics to keep me busy for a year! 

If you are strug­gling with this same fear, spend an hour or so writ­ing down every les­son that you have learned that has helped you get to where you are in your career or life.  Write down the vic­to­ries and the fail­ures.  Include as many top­ics as you can.  Don’t worry about hav­ing the catchi­est title or cat­e­go­riz­ing them at this stage.  Just do a com­plete brain dump and you will be sur­prised and maybe even amazed by what you come up with.

Then, look to those who know you well for addi­tional sug­ges­tions.  You may find that some­thing sim­ple you have taken for granted has made a pow­er­ful impact on some­one close to you.

Cre­at­ing my list showed me that, because of what I get to do each and every day as a coach, I have plenty of sto­ries and insights that I have learned from many of you, my clients.  So thank you!  What you have shared with me has given me ammu­ni­tion to help many others.

As Seth Godin says in Tribes, our world needs more strong lead­ers with a point of view.  What you have learned can be shared to pos­i­tively impact so many lives.

For any of you think­ing about enhanc­ing your brand through social net­work­ing, you now have my first blog­ging tip.  I hope it helps a few of you to jump on into the conversation!

Related posts:

1. Daniel Harkavy Has a Blog?

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plu­gin.

Tags: Blogging, Brain Dump, Social Networking

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 at 9:59 am and is filed under Communication. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.