31 Days of Submissive Journaling – Day 21: Your First Blog Post

You’ve made the decision that you’re going to keep a blog, you’ve picked your host, you’ve designed your site, and now it comes down to the writing.

And then you clean the dishes, and the bathroom. And you take a walk. And you build a condo for the squirrels to live in, and you think about everything but the computer and your blog, and the empty word document that you’re supposed to fill, because having made all of the important decisions about your blog, you’re now confronted with the most terrifying which is: what do I write first?

What do you write for your first blog post? How do blogs even begin? Surely, the successful blogs just spawn fully formed, with months of backlog and a following of approximately thirty people who have all commented and liked each of the really important, ground breaking entries.

If only.

The short answer to the question, “How do I begin?” is that you just do. You write whatever the heck you want to write, addressing it to the purest form of your intended audience. It honestly doesn’t matter what your first post addresses, because chances are, where you end up comfortable will be so far away from where you begin that your first post is like a shadowy rough draft of all the posts that follow it.

The long answer breaks down a little more like this:

Determine your audience.

If you’re writing just for yourself and your Dom, you don’t need to worry about where you begin. All of  the information that you share, each of your inside jokes, informs your Dom of all of the context that he/she needs in order to understand your writing. You can pick up wherever you feel most comfortable: with a story, with reflection, with a love letter.

If you’re writing for a the general public, then you’ll want to make your first post a little less casual and a little more introductory. You’ll want to start by providing your readers with the context they will need to understand the purpose of your blog and to enjoy the stories that you tell. There are a couple of different “introductory” posts that you could write. Think about the kind of blog that you envision keeping, and see which of the following best benefits your style:

The “Hello, My Name Is…”

The first post you write can simply be an introduction to who you are. What’s your pen name? What do you do for a living? What kind of submissive are you? What are your hobbies? What days do you intend to write blog posts, and what kind of writing are you looking to explore? Give your readers a clear picture of you, allow them to develop a first impression of you as a writer, as a person, and as a submissive.

The Mission Statement

Maybe you don’t want to be personal. That’s okay, too. You can write a perfectly good introduction to your blog without giving any extraneous information about yourself to your reader. Just focus your writing on the topic of what you intent to do with the blog. Is it primarily for reflection or is it more informative? Are you writing sensual smut stories that feature you and your Dom? Are you creating how-to guides for keeping house, cooking, or some other common submissive task? Writing a mission statement allows your readers to see exactly what you intend to do with your blog, and it’s a good way for you to keep yourself on track if find yourself drifting slightly left field of your original intentions.

The Anecdote

If you’re focusing more on the creative spectrum, you can knock out your first post by letting it take the form of an anecdote. Tell a story that you feel really shows you, and exemplifies your blog’s intention. Be as creative as you like, or present the facts as is. People are usually pretty happy to get to know their bloggers through funny stories or thrilling accounts of recent (or long passed) happenings.

En Medias Res

If you aren’t a “beginner” then don’t begin. Pretend you’ve already got your ideal readership, pretend they already know everything they need to know, and write. Don’t let anyone tell you that you have to begin at all if beginning makes you feel uncomfortable, and don’t feel like you have to do the “boring introduction to things” if you’ve already got a great idea for what you want to talk about. In fact, the best thing that you can do for your blog is to treat it exactly the way you intend to treat it once it’s “well established.”

Post Au Mass

Sometimes the pressure for beginning comes from the idea that there’s only one post to start. The issue isn’t necessarily that you don’t know what to say, you just don’t want it to look like it’s the only thing that you’ve got to say. You can circumvent that completely by writing two or three different posts and then putting them up at once. Who cares if you post three times in one day, and then don’t post again for a week? If you’re beginning your blog and you want to make it feel like you’re establishing yourself, sometimes the best thing for you to do is force the internet to make some room for you. So post to your heart’s content, no matter how many articles you post in a single day at the beginning.

The ultimate goal for starting is the idea that you’ll eventually continue where you left off, so my most important advice that I can give you is to make sure that your first post is a positive one that sets you up for an exciting writing experience. Remember that writing shouldn’t feel like a chore, and if it does, you need to look at what you’re writing and how you’re writing it. Challenge yourself, but don’t frustrate yourself. You (and your Dom) are your own boss in this one, so there’s absolutely no right or wrong way to write as long as you keep yourself going.

If you need additional help, can’t think of any topics, or you’re just a little uncertain of what makes a good blog post, check out Submissive Guide’s submissive journal prompts to get yourself started.

Until next time,

Kallista