One of the best parts of being an adjunct professor, is that I get paid to learn and help others become better professionals and hopefully better people. It is a wonderful thing to see this same thing happening with The Blogcademy, a international blogging conference that I attended last week. I have been following Shauna Haider, one of the headmistresses of The Blogcademy, also the blogger of infamous design site Nubby Twiglet for the last four years. I have used her work as an example in many of the portfolio and design classes I have taught.
She's been an inspiration for designers across the world, and ultimately has shown how to live a professional 'blogger lifestyle" by incorporating all of her passions - ie. design, fashion, and photography. Her design, marketing website gets over 150k hits a month. It's no surprise because she writes tons of interesting articles that are helpful for new designers and fashion enthusiasts.
Everything that she does is noteworthy -- the photography on her site is always beautiful, her design work is exquisite and edgy, her fashion and shoe choices are really fun! I feel like what she produces is so in-line with exactly how I feel on internally about being a designer and a-secretly-aspiring-blogger,but haven't been able to accomplish yet.
When I found out that she and her equally successful two besties Kat Williams from Rock n' Roll Bride Magazine and Gala Darling all created The Blogcademy I knew that I needed to attend. All of their promo materials showed the stylish, fun event, and the people in the audience and I thought to myself... "These are the kind of women I want to surround myself with!"
So I bit the bullet and purchased my seat as a birthday present to celebrate "me" and a gift to my new life as a blogger! It ended up being one of the best conferences I have ever been to. It was intimate, it was filled with the information that was so spot-on to what I had been looking for, that it went by in a flash. I started to imagine how we could turn this into a more frequent event.
From the moment that I walked into the cool photo studio in Los Angeles, I saw women decorated in bunny ears and sparkly headbands, and I fell in love. Now see, I don't consider myself to be "fashionable", or as trendsetting as these other ladies, but I do aspire to become so in the near future. I am a firm believer in aligning myself with people who are living their bliss and doing what I aspire to do someday. Well that day is today!
The entire weekend was so inspirational! It not only built my confidence, but I felt like I made great connections with wonderful women whom I do indeed have a lot in common with.
Shauna, Kat, and Gala were seriously entertaining, hilarious, attentive, positive, welcoming and a great example of truly "living your bliss." It made me not only want to be their friend, but also want to have more friends that were so deeply in-line with similar passions and career aspirations!
We learned how to create valuable content, how to commit to consistency and frequency of our blogs, and of course tons of secrets on how to make everything from my brand to my photography skills (which are modest) to look uber fashionable and amazing! I also learned how to find inspiration in my everyday life and the importance of creating unique and original content.
I came home and made a list of 200 blog topics, and am starting tofollow my editorial calendar starting today. One of the things that I learned, is that you just need to start and keep it up, because "slow and steady" wins the race.
I'm excited to find my voice, influence others, and finally live this "blogger lifestyle" that I have been dreaming about for years. I am also proud of myself for investing in myself, because it was absolutely worth every penny. Now I am moving up to LA in the next few months and the girls I met are going to meet once a month to talk about blogging. This is priceless! If you get a chance, check out The Blogcademy when it comes to your city!
Down below, share your thoughts and reflections of your favorite conference or workshop! How did it change your life or business?
