Blogging: Expectations Vs Reality

If you are reading this and it is a Monday then I have officially started my new schedule which I feel really really good about. If you didn't see my last post you might not know I live in Houston and I flooded and things have been kind of hectic and I think this new schedule is me trying to make at least part of my life kind of not crazy because blogging is a pretty big part of my life. Ok, now that I got that part out of the way I am super excited to announce that this post is a collab with the one and only Charis Rae!  She is an amazing blogger who recently switched blogs and had a blog tour which fun fact I participated in.  She is like that blogger who is super organized and has an email list and self-hosts and an amazing design and pretty much everything else. So a couple weeks ago I contacted her asking her if she wanted to collab and she replied which is awesome in and of itself so we decided we would do a blogging expectation vs reality post. It was scheduled for the 2nd but then Harvey happened so of course, I couldn't post it. I probably changed the date I wanted to post this like ten times so thank you, Charis, for being so cool about but now the time has finally come. So if you are reading this you are either a blogger or just a blog reader. This post will probably be amusing for both of these kinds of people/other living beings (you can't forget about the unicorns) so feel free to keep reading. When I started blogging I believed pretty much all of this so like don't feel bad.

Getting Followers

"I will become popular overnight"

or 

"No one will ever follow me and I will be alone forever!"

There are actually two expectations that people have for this which is kind of interesting. I would say the main one is that it is super easy to get new followers and that everyone will flock to your blog. The second would be the opposite which is thinking that no one will go to your blog like ever. That's actually kind of sad. 

The reality would have to be somewhere in between. Yes if you are a good blogger that posts consistent and engaging content then people will look at your blog. But it probably won't be super quick as some people might like you to believe. Things like going viral or becoming an overnight sensation actually happen less often than some people might think. 

Taking Pictures

"I will have the cleanest cutest photos ever and they will be shot on my actual camera."

The expectation is pretty much that you will take the best pictures on the planet if it is super clean flat lays or exotic travel pics. The other part of this is that you think you will use an "actual camera" to shoot all of these photos. 

Ok so at least for me I already loved photography before I started this blog and I loved the idea of taking photos on an "actual camera". What I meant by that is pretty much any camera that is not a phone camera. The reality of this is that a lot of phones are better than "actual cameras" and the cameras that are better than phones are super complicated and also expensive which is why I don't have one. Also, the thing is that photography it is a lot harder than some people think. With phones now people can take some pretty good pictures all on their own for maybe Instagram once or twice a week or just a picture of a family. For blogging though you usually need quite a bit of photos that are not fuzzy and pretty good quality which can be hard at times. 

Making Money

"I will just post and I will get like a million dollars."

Some people go into blogging solely to get money because the expectation of things like blogging and being a youtube or general social media star is that you can become rich and famous and it is super easy. 

Sadly that is not the case or I would have bought myself an "actual camera" by now. There are a lot of ways to make money that is true. There are things like advertisements and working with brands. Things like getting brands to work with you or placing ads in a place that will actually look ok though is pretty hard. I have researched this quite a bit so you can believe me. 

Post Ideas And Authenticness 

"All of my posts will be amazing and beautiful and original. "

Because of course, you are like the best human on the planet you think your posts will be amazing and original and you would of course never steal an idea or do anything like that. 

The reality is that one writer's block or bloggers block is very real and running out of ideas is a huge problem. Like you know those times when your mind is like a literal blank space and your just like "I can not think at all right now!"? But even if you do come up with a blog post idea which can happen sometimes I bet you like a million dollars it isn't truly original. The internet is so big and humongous and kind of crazy that pretty much anything you do has been done before. 

Actual footage of me trying to think of blog post ideas. 

First, make sure to go check out Charis's  blog because it is pretty awesome and she is doing her own expectation vs reality post which is also very awesome. Second, my birthday is in 9 days and I'm turning 13 so I am officially accepting happy birthday wishes and both real and virtual cake/gifts/giphs. Third I might do a bigger post on this later but I feel like I have changed a lot this year. Like I am a lot more out there. I literally wore stickers on my face to a restaurant recently which you could take as me acting like a kid or just me being me. Like I'm not even sure. And of course, if you liked this post make sure to follow using either the little blogger gadget over to the left or Bloglovin which you can find right above it or right here. 

Are you a blogger? What was something you believed when you started blogging that turned out not to be true? Do you agree with anything on this list? Did I totally blow your mind with my post (the answer to this is of course yes)?