By the third year, I should have felt like I had this blogging thing handled. I was still learning. I started WordPress’s Blogging 101 to learn more, I lost interest by lesson #2.

In my second year, I was trying to maintain an unattainable blogging schedule, so by the following year, I had already started to cut back, and keep my sanity.

I wrote 112 posts and my visitors grew exponentially – well over 5k. Nice.

The Sis and I had moved back to Vegas that year. We needed to get back on our feet. LA is a difficult city to navigate if you’re not prepared. We moved into a nice little house outside of town. We had plenty of room for me to have my own office, except my pups didn’t like me being upstairs (so weird, I know), so eventually I had to move my desk down so they could at least be near me while I worked.

I got a job…finally. Writing. Or so I thought. It was a content writer position, and it was not at all what I was expecting. It was not creative. It was tedious. And the company I worked for was shady and underhanded and ran the writer’s room like a sweat shop. I didn’t last 8 months.

I find myself surprised I was able to create anything for my blog in hindsight. That work sapped my creativity and I remember my hands were tired from the long hours of typing nonsense.

It was around this time that I said I was “happy with my script” (which I clearly was not because I am finally now happy with it…huh, I suppose happiness really is relative), and I entered it into one of the most prestigious screenwriting competitions. It did not do well.

I started research for my pilot, and generated so. many. ideas – three seasons worth – and yet I am still not happy with it. We’ll get there eventually.

I began sharing reviews, the writing prompts inspired people to share their own creations, and my blog felt like it was coming into its own.

Not to toot my own horn, but I found myself proud that I had been able to maintain my blog for so long. I was never able to keep a journal or diary for any length of time, so three years was quite the milestone for me.

And I was only at the start of it.

I’d like to shout out a BIG

to all of you for your support and encouragement. I wouldn’t be where I am today without it.

xx, Rach

My first year, WordPress says I published 49 posts. I had 142 visitors.

By Year Two I was on a roll. I had written 163 posts and had 1,655 visitors. I remember feeling accomplished that year. By that August, I had shared nearly 40 writing prompts.

Well, look at that. Nearly one a week. ((sigh))

I shared more tips, useful websites, and a little more about who I was and how I was becoming more comfortable with myself as a writer. I also shared the beginning of what would become my Dragon Age obsession.

It may be even worse now.

But I’m okay with that.

Side note, this is the image that started me down my fan fiction rabbit hole. –>

Do I regret the subsequent 200k+ words?

Nope. Not in the least.

That year I decided to be brave. I hadn’t read my work aloud since college, so one night in my writer’s group, I finally shared, and I was as nervous as I had been that first time in my screenwriting class. Surrounded by fellow writers, friends, my voice shook and I remember feeling fearful of their judgement, despite how supportive the environment was. I was worried they would find my writing inferior, even if they would never say such out loud, and the thing I love to do would be tainted.

I haven’t had the opportunity to have my work read aloud again since. At the Austin Film Festival a few years ago, I pitched my story, and whoo, still as nervous as ever. I’ve waited tables, bartended, worked in sales, and run huge events, and yet talking about my writing still has me shaking in my boots.

Hopefully, with more exposure, that will lessen in time.

One can only hope.

Year Two had me coming out of my shell. I was in my blogging groove, I was feeling productive, despite (still) not having a day job, and I was getting myself out “there” in the hopes it would lead me to the right connection.

It didn’t…but I was actively trying.

Looking back, that was a pretty good year, and some more of you have been joining me for all the ups and downs since.

Thank you!

xx, Rach

10 years.

I have been keeping a blog about writing, some times not so well, for 10 years.

When I got the notification, I’ll be honest, I had a not so happy reaction. While an achievement on my part, that’s some decent commitment, I was struck by how little had changed in all this time.

I am still writing the same things here all these years later. I’m still spouting positivity. I’m still cheering on the pursuit of following one’s dreams. All the while, not having made any inroads on my own career path.

And surprisingly, we’re back in California. How’s that for a bookend?

10 years ago, when I started this blog, it was because I hadn’t been able to find a (day) job for a year. I had sent out over 200 applications and only received 2 responses. I was depressed. I wasn’t writing. I was lost.

The Sis and I had a good talk then. We had moved to LA, mainly, for my writing, so if the job market wasn’t going to give me anything, then I make something for myself. She was making really good money at the time, and had already been supporting us in that uneventful/dreadful year, so she told me to start writing. That was my job.

It was a bitter pill to swallow, but I gave it a go.

I started attending networking events. I joined a writer’s group. I made writer friends. I started my blog. (Actually, now thinking on it, I started it elsewhere, I can’t remember where. This one came along a short time later.)

I was pretty clear from the beginning what I wanted my blog to be about. I never wanted to be on a soap box. I didn’t want to voice my opinions on things that weren’t related to writing (no matter how much I wanted to sometimes). I wanted this to be an encouraging environment. I wanted only notes of positivity and inspiration, because as I’ve said, at least a dozen times before, writing is a lonely, often times difficult road, and we should be supportive of one another.

That first year I offered a number of tips. I wanted writers to accept themselves and their work. I wanted to help them find inspiration, deal with rejection, be prepared for the path ahead, and discover opportunities. I wanted us all to be a little kinder to ourselves.

I still want ALL those things.

It’s hard to look back and realize how little I’ve advanced in my career. (Side note, thanks to The Sis for her supportive perspective – I have not actively pursued my dream job for a solid 10 years.) I’ve always wanted to be a writer, but only in the last few years have I become the writer I want to be. I actually have pride in a number of my stories, and yes, one of them is a work of fan fiction. I didn’t have that 10 years ago.

A decade is a big chunk of time. Just think of all the things that have happened since 2013. Crazy, right?!

There are some of you who have been with me since the beginning, and I can’t thank you enough for your support. I didn’t really know what I was doing all those years ago, but you stuck with me all the same. Even when I’m consistently inconsistent. Which is like all the time. I’m still kicking around here because of you, so, thanks!

And I hope to prove in the near future that it wasn’t in vain, so…

Happy 10th Blogging Anniversary to me. ((half cringing-crying-smiling)) 😉

xx, Rach