Your Community Matters: Build It.

I have 351 facebook friends (I am very selective to who I accept on my personal facebook), and 833 instagram friends (I hate the word followers) and maybe 3% of them are interested in the things I am. Of all my connections maybe less than 50 are avid planning, planner stickers, organization, and productivity lovers. 

You see that look on your face! That "how can you be interested in those things" look. Yea I get that a lot. What can I say, I'm a mom trying to establish a business and build a brand. Planning, organization and productivity are necessary in my life. 

About 70% of the people on my social media are family/friends/selective coworkers (that's a blog post in itself). The other 30% discovered me from my youtube or on instagram. 

In order to maintain the zeal that I have about these things I had to incorporate a community of others who shared these interests. I had to fellowship with people like myself in these areas in order to maintain my authenticity. At first I would follow hashtags and began liking photos. I began discovering people that I could connect with. Then I would begin commenting and growing my interactions. I had to make the first move.  Now I have planner friends! who knew! 

Had I never began reaching out and establishing instafriends (friends on social media who you connect with over interests but will never meet in real life) I would not stopped being myself and suppressed the things that truly made me happy.

I remember when I began couponing. I started couponing 9 years ago and it was not the popular sport that it is today. Today everyone is a couponer; you go into the store and have to wait behind 3-4 aunties with their billfolds full of coupons. I've even seen a few uncles in the store filling up their carts with the latest deals. When I began it was an undiscovered art and I knew no one who knew how to do it or even cared. It wasn't until I began diving into couponing and sharing the amazing deals that people in my circle began to notice. I learned to be unapologetic about my interests that I my community grew and grew.  

Now that my interests have changed it's now time to establish my a new community.  That's life. You evolve and so does things you put your time and energy into. You may say well that's easy. No. Sharing my couponing journey was easy. Who doesn't want to save money. But to tell people that I love to play with stickers so much that I've created my own Etsy shop. That's a different struggle.

This is not to talk down about our family and friends. When it's important they are there, they support. But to build something from the ground up, to grow a hobby into a passion, to be interested in something all alone. You have to build your community. 

You have to begin to interact. Begin to speak. Social media gets such a bad rep but there's so much power in social media. We have the ability to connect with people we would never meet. We are able to establish positive connects, boost one another, inspire, teach and learn. All from people all across the world and at a click of a mouse. Social media helps shatter boundaries and when used properly is the best us diving into unknown or unsupported territory. 

I know many of you are suffocating. Tired of being shut down by the people we KNOW because we didn't realize there were so many people out there who liked pretty planner stickers like us (insert your interests). 

Now let me add this disclaimer. As refreshing as social media can be it is also a scary place. People are always on the prowl trying to take advantage of anyone that they are able to. So use your judgement when building your community. You don't really know these people. 

So Grow 

Build

Establish

Commune with people who are into your interests

Thrive