Running is not only good for your health but also for your blog. Running can help you improve blogging. It does not directly contribute to your blog. You will benefit indirectly in blogging by running. How does that happen?

Image Source: Jog by AlphaTangoBravo / Adam Baker

I am a huge fan of cardio and love to run a 5k. But I am no where near it. I started running only to reduce weight. Surprisingly it helped me improve blogging. I could easily brainstorm blog posts by running few minutes a day.

You don’t necessarily have to try for a 5k run but there is no reason why you shouldn’t. If you are new to running, I recommend you to read this blog post on Beginner’s guide to running by Leo at Zen Habits, which encouraged me to run.

Without further ado, let’s discuss the benefits of running and how it will improve your blogging skills:

1. No More Blogger’s Block

Blogger’s block is a term which you would have heard very often in the blogosphere. It is something that people always find it tough to avoid. But the truth is that there is no such thing called blogger’s block. It is just a mental perception. You are imagining things. To prove my point, let me give you an example:

Would you not write a post if Darren Rowse went for a holiday and requested a guest post from you?

How is that you are able to write now? It is only your attitude towards blogging. But I accept I’m also a victim of it. I tend to imagine things that are not real. I have had days when I cannot sit down and write a blog post. Things have changed now. One of the reasons for it is running. Let me make it clear for you:

When you start running, you will never have blogger’s block.

As Will Smith says in this video called “Key To Life”

When you’re running, there is an inner person that talks to you, which says “Oh I’m tired. My lungs are about to pop off. There is no way I could possibly continue.” You want to quit. If you learn how to defeat that inner person, you’ll learn how to not quit when things get hard in your life (I haven’t transcribed that perfectly).

Watch the video here.

2. Spend Time Off from Your Computer

If you are like ‘previous me’, you would spend most of the time in front of computer. Let me tell you, it isn’t good for health. It is also not good for blogging. When you are always sitting in front of computer, you cannot think to your full capabilities. You have to give your mind some rest and getting off from your computer for a run will help you a lot. You will become more creative and your posts will have much better impact.

3. Brainstorm Topic Ideas

I can tell you frankly that most of my articles are brainstormed when I am either running or walking. I rarely get a blog post idea when I am sitting in front of computer. As Robin Sharma says in his book called Greatness Guide: The best thing you could do is, spend time thinking. Spend time brainstorming blog posts. You could do this effectively when you are running. When I am running, I think about blog post ideas or a social media plan.

4. Things around You Helps

When you are running or jogging, look around you. Take a quick note of things around you, in your mind. Come home and write everything you saw in a real notebook or Google notebook. Write down everything, from a baby playing with a ball to a dog chasing someone. Don’t leave out anything that you saw. This increases your memory power and also helps you create more blog posts. How does this help? It’s very simple logic. You should try to relate everything you see outside with blogging. You could write “Why blogging is as awesome as seeing a baby smile” or “Why you should run away from (something here) as if a dog is chasing you”. These are just small examples. You can brainstorm at least five blog post ideas everyday.

Have you ever had the feeling that you can not post on a specific day because you don’t have the mood for it? If you are already running, have you felt an increase in your blogging skill? Please share your views in the comments.

P.S: Connect with on twitter and friendfeed so we can carry the conversation there

Update: Jesse Stay, who is the founder of socialtoo – the site that offers the twitter auto follow service, posted a reply in the comments of this post and also in friendfeed share (posted by Louis Gray of Louis Gray.Com). SocialToo also offers auto unfollow option, which I forgot to mention in this post. Please see this friendfeed share for more information.

Twitter is becoming famous everyday with so many people joining. You can find me in twitter here – Ramkarthik. All the new users need twitter followers to make sure their words are noticed by some people. Every twitter user likes to have many followers. Sometimes people don’t spend time to learn about twitter and spam the place. In this post you’ll find why you shouldn’t use twitter auto follow.

People, who join twitter, add the ones they know. Later they start to add new people. There is nothing wrong with this. But when people get over excited about twitter, they start following too many people in a single day or spam the community with tons of links.

Coming to talk about twitter auto follow, it is a service that let’s you follow twitter users automatically, once they follow you. Any person, who follows you, will be followed back automatically. You do not have the option of selecting whom to follow.

Image Soure: Twitter Influence by mil8

Here are 3 reasons why should not

1. All Links And No Real Update
There are twitter users who post every link of their blog post and do nothing much other than that. They add people in bulk; say 2000 twitter users at once. When you use twitter auto follow, you will be automatically following them. Why would you want to read tweets with links to blog posts all the time? If the profile created is on the name of a blog, you can expect them to tweet only blog post links. But some twitter users have their own names and do only blog promotion in twitter. I’m not saying that these people are bad. It is just that they haven’t understood twitter properly and will take time for them to learn about it.

2. Irrelevant Tweets
When you follow everyone who follows you, you are not using twitter efficiently. Let me give you an example. You have a blog probably (If you are new to blogging, I recommend you to read this free ebook). Even if you don’t have, assume that you own one. You write good blog posts and people are reading it. They subscribe to your blog. Will you subscribe to all of your subscribers’ blog? Of course not. If it was that way, Darren Rowse would have to subscribe to 7000 blogs, even if one tenth of his subscribers have a blog. So to make your twitter page relevant, follow only people who talk about things that interest you.

3. Follow And Unfollow
Twitter users who want to have many followers, add many twitter users. Once you follow them back, after a couple of days, they unfollow you. What’s the disadvantage here? Well, you followed a user because he/she followed you and now they have unfollowed you. When you are using auto follow, you automatically follow these people who unfollow users once they have added them. To avoid this, you should stop using auto follow, wait till the twitter user tweets you or tweets something interesting and then add him/her. Sometimes, you cannot avoid people by doing this too. You should start using Qwitter which will help you to know, who the users that are unfollowing you are.
Do you use auto follow? Why do you use auto follow? If you have valid points, I’ll include it in the next post. We could write a post on the advantages of using twitter auto follow. Please share your views in the comments.

P.S: Don’t forget to add me in twitter. My user name is Ramkarthik.

P.P.S: The link to the free report is an affiliate link.