My “office” – a friendly, neighborhood, wifi-enabled café where I sit and blog most mornings.
Dave over at the excellent The Disquiet blog has asked me why I blog. And that is a great question.
I started blogging 4 years ago, have written over 1000 posts, and the blog became insanely popular last year in May. At the outset, I had no plans or goals with blogging, and I blogged about both personal and business themes.
Since the blog became I hit, I’ve tightened the focus, and now I only blog about happiness at work. I feel I wouldn’t be serving my readers properly, if I suddenly started writing about the movie I saw last night or the latest episode of Lost :o)
Anyway, here are my five main reasons for blogging.
1: It makes me happy
Blogging makes me happy for many reasons. First of all, the pride of having written a great blogpost. That feels goooooood. I always blog in café (here’s a picture of my “office”), and many are the times I’ve left the place after a good morning’s writing, totally high on having created something I’m proud of.
Then there’s the pleasure of giving. Knowing that I can help people all over the world out, and give them ideas and inspiration. That’s the one thing I like the most about blogging – that it’s very much a gift economy. And that the more each of us give, the more we get.
2: My blog is my spare brain
Increasingly, my blog is my spare brain. When I find a great quote, blogpost, article, idea I post it to the blog or to my link collection. And I often search my own blog for “you know, that article where that guy said that thing about that company.”
3: To sell by giving
My blog is also my professional website. This is how companies find me and hire me to speak and consult. And MAN does that ever work.
4: To find playmates
Here’s a funny story. Way back in 2003, Fast Company mentioned this woman called Traci Fenton who works with organizational democracy. I wrote this blogpost about it. Some weeks later Traci Googled herself, found my blogpost and contacted me. We found that organizational democracy and happiness at work are intimately connected and that we work for almost exactly the same things in the workplace. I’ve since spoken at two of her conferences in Washington DC, Traci has visited me in Copenhagen and we’ve become great friends.
And stuff like that happens more and more.
As a kid, I could just leave the house, go out on the street and instantly find playmates. As an adult, it’s not quite that easy. The blog is a great way to find playmates.
5: To make people happy at work
Well, duh! :o)
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