The #2Articles1Week writing challenge is put on by Hashnode with this purpose:

The goal of this challenge is to encourage writers to define their writing goals, understand writing standards, become consistent at writing, and build their career.

As a new blogger, I thought this would be a great challenge for me to try and tackle as I wanted to build up consistency with my writing. Plus, I liked the added bonus of receiving badges on my profile 😁🏅. Now that I've wrapped up the challenge, I want to share the five lessons I've learned with the hopes that it inspires others to continue or start their blogging journey.

1) Consistency is Key 🔑

In my opinion, being consistent is the crux of this whole challenge. By committing to writing a set number of blog posts in a week, you are working on building a habit that will eventually become second nature. The initial process of writing regularly may feel foreign at first, but the continual reps will (hopefully) make writing feel less like a chore and more like a fun part of your routine.

Blogs like Chris Bongers - Daily Dev Tips are fantastic examples of consistency.

2) Create a Backlog of Ideas 💡

When thinking of starting my blog, one of my fears was that I would quickly run out of things to write. Once I sat down and started writing down ideas; however, I realized that I had more to share than I had originally thought. I use the Kanban board view in Notion to add and keep track of my ideas, articles in the process of being drafted, and published posts.

3) Be a Fan 👏

Make sure to be a fellow consumer of the audience that you would like to consume your content. Join the community.

Being a fan is a tip that was instilled in me when I read the book, Show Your Work by Austin Kleon. We are all writers sharing our content with an audience. But it's also important that we take the time to read others' content and support other bloggers. I find that the Hashnode community is really great about doing this and is a trait that I appreciate immensely! 💙

4) Do Your Research 👩🏽‍🏫

I always want to ensure that I know what I'm talking about when I attempt to teach others through my writing. Expertise is not required, but it is essential to include valid information in your teaching material. I think most people get stuck at this point because they think they have to be subject matter experts. It can be intimidating to write technical articles, but I like to think of it as an opportunity to fine-tune my knowledge on a topic and grow as a developer.

5) Have Fun! 😃

To be honest, I struggle with this one the most. It is so easy to get caught up in the numbers, such as how many views my most recent post has or the number of likes or subscribers I've accumulated. In a simple sentence:

Try not to let the analytics get to you.

The main reason I started this blog is to learn in public and hopefully help out other developers along the way. That's what matters most.

El Fin 👋🏽

Those are the five lessons I've learned. I hope that this anecdotal article proves to be a source of encouragement for you. I'm just a novice blogger trying to teach some technical topics and provide some encouragement along the way. Best of luck to everyone who is already blogging consistently and those who are looking to improve their writing streak!

As always, thank you for reading and happy coding!

[Photo by hannah grace on Unsplash]