My absolute favorite thing about blogging?

100% hands down is the people I have met!

I feel sooo unbelievably blessed to have such a support system here in the blogosphere, and it really does reach out into my real life! Awhile ago, before I really started being serious about my blog, I would read posts about how much people loved all of the friends that they had made since starting a blog. Over the past couple of months I've actually started figuring out what that looked like!

[How many times can I say blog in one post??]

Seriously, I can't even begin to express how much these women [YOU women!] have impacted my life. Sometimes I will be having a conversation with one of my IRL friends and I will say something like, "Oh that's funny my friend so-and-so was just talking about that the other day!" Which translates to, "OMG my blogging bff just wrote a post about that!!".

[In my head I am always way more excited than I express in real life... if you know me you know this is true]

I don't have a giant successful blog, but I am still going to lend my advice to all you people out there...

Here it is: If you blog, reach out to the people around you. Seriously, it will change your entire experience of this whole realm of life. 

My whole experience changed when I stopped focusing on how many followers I had for my own blog, and started building some real relationships with the other people out there. I'm sure some of you would like to hear that this is the key to increasing the number of followers, but it isn't. My blog has grown a tiny bit, but the real thing that has changed is that I've actually made some friends in the process. And the best part is that they accept me for who I am and just want to be a support!

If you don't blog, you can still reach out to the people around you! Through this whole process I've learned that I can actually make friends, or be closer friends with the ones I already have, and not just with people who are a million miles away and who I don't have to have a real conversation with. I'll be honest, I have a hard time making friends, and an even harder time keeping friends. It's hard. It sucks. I always wonder what is wrong with me. But I think through meeting and making blog friends I realize that people just want to know that you care about them, and to know that you value who they are! 

Part of this comes with learning to truly accept people for who they are. I'm not in my friendships to change anyone. They are the ones that are changing me! I'm so incredibly blessed by the people that are in my life, and they continually teach me to love and accept myself, as well as others.

So I just want to say thank you to those of you that follow along here. Even if you don't stop in to read my posts, I'm honored just to be on your little "blog roll" of blogs that you do follow! And I'm thankful that you have been an encouragement to me in one way or another.

There you have it. The thing that keeps me reading everyone else's posts far more often than I read or write my own!