My wife and I got a taste of using fireplaces routinely in New Zealand.

Most of the country does not get cold enough to warrant heating. But for whatever reason, homes are not built to keep cold out and to keep heat in. End result; serious drafts build up during winter months. We first became fireplace pros on the South Island especially.

But we genuinely stepped things up in Cappadocia, Turkey. The cave-home heating turned out to be manual: all heating was solely by wood burning stoves. Some nights we froze our rear ends off until we became skilled enough to get the fire going.

Here in New England today – as the temperature drops – me and my wife lit a roaring fire in an old-fashioned wood burning stove. Although the homeowners have an oil burner I prefer to use the stove because seeing the thermostat raise from 70 to 78 in under an hour or so makes for a satisfying, organic, comfortable heat.

Blogging is like lighting a fire in a wood burning stove.

Here's why.

Prepare

I scooped out all ash to prep the stove for a fire. Ash interferes with the process because you need a clean surface for proper airflow. I also ensured all wood collected from the shed was completely dry. Good luck trying to get a fire going with damp wood.

Blogs need prep work too. Before writing and publishing a post make sure your theme and overall design is clean of fat, bloat, or any extraneous elements distracting readers. Trim the fat. Cut the bloat. Clean things up to streamline your operation.

Format Properly

We used all types of log stacks in Turkey – being desperate when temperatures dropped to the low 20's F as you tried to get a fire going – but the tried and true 2 logs on the bottom spaced apart and one log laid diagonally across does the trick routinely. Formatting is everything. Crowd the logs and you have not enough space for the fire to grow. Spreading the logs too far apart guarantees the flame cannot spread from log to log.

Blogging is no different; formatting plays a key role in creating scannable posts, making blogs easy to read on mobile devices. Use short, sweet paragraphs, headers, bold text, italics and lists to create tempo to your posts. Wrap your blog content in eye-catching formatting to boost your traffic and to increase social shares.

Be Deliberate, Patient and Persistent

I learned to deliberating, patiently and persistently let a flame build into a roaring fire by:

  • igniting the starter in the proper spot
  • opening the door about 1/2 of an inch to let the updraft gradually fan the flame
  • closing the door at the right moment to preserve the heat, flame and fire for hours

Practice, practice and more practice seems to be the only way to develop the skill of lighting a raging, roaring, wood burning stove fire. Both my wife and I practiced multiple times daily for 6 weeks in rural Turkey. We also had similar practice during winter months on the South Island of New Zealand.

Bloggers need to deliberately, patiently and persistently practice writing blog posts, networking generously and monetizing freely over a long period of time to become skilled enough to go pro. No one goes pro overnight. We all need to keep at it for a long time before lighting a roaring blogging fire as an in-demand professional blogger. Be deliberate, precise and mindful. Add in patience and persistence. Success will find you but only if you see the journey through because the skill known as blogging has many moving parts.

Build Success MomentumTips to become a Professional Blogger

I added 1-2 logs every 20 minutes or more to keep the raging fire hot. The fire grew and temperature increased with each successive log I added to the stove.

Blogging success momentum grows after years of writing and publishing blog posts, networking generously and monetizing. Keep building your momentum daily to create something special over the long haul.

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