Blogging all the way to glory

I realised a few days back that I have successfully completed more than an year as a blogger. I came across the term blogging around two years back when I heard the news that the government was planning to monitor the contents of the blogs. The entire blogging community had come up in arms against the decision and the government eventually bulked down before the collective voices.
This word remained dormant in my mind. During those days, I was trying to get a few of my articles published in a leading daily. I did meet with some success but then I had to avoid topics which went against the ideology of the newspaper. I felt that this would leave me nowhere and decided that I needed a platform of my own.

I happened to come across Sulekha.com. I read somewhere in the papers that this site had a tie-up with Penguin Publishers. Prospects to see myself published by Penguin led me with its siren like charm into the new world of blogging. But then there was a lull for a long while. I got registered but didn’t want to publish anything on a blog of all places. Wasn’t I someone who had been paid earlier for my write-ups?
But as the days passed by, I felt that I should be posting my unused articles on the blog lest they go out of date. Soon I found myself posting all my unpublished articles on my blog. My blogs got featured on Sulekha and comments started pouring in. I must say that it were these comments that spurred my instinct to write more and better.

I started searching for issues around. I sensed an opportunity in every upheaval that stirred my mind. Thus began a long innings of blogging. I always felt that not many were interested to listen to what I had to say on these burning issues which kept my head preoccupied. I found a channel, and rather a constructive channel, to let out all that I felt strongly about. It could be the Gujarat elections, the release of Jodha Akbar or a book review. But write I did and found many takers for those writings.
Slowly my friends started reading those blogs and those who shared my passion started with their own blogs as well. I met people from far off lands who were co-travellers on my path. WE regularly posted comments on each other’s blog posts. I sensed a new vigour in my life.
Exams and interviews came in my way. But they failed to be dampeners in my stride. Reading and responding to different views also made my thinking more broad and accommodating.
Then came my MBA program, which I felt would mark a full stop for my blogs. I refused to be cowed down by my workload. I would utilise every small break I would get to read newspapers and write blogs using my laptop.
Meanwhile, many of my articles started appearing in print. Some newspapers also picked up my blogs and paid me handsomely. I also found new converts along my way. I persuaded some of my lecturers to start their own blogs and articulate their opinions.

Today, I see a prospect for a write-up in everything that comes my way. To become an opinion maker is every writer’s dream but being so is not an easy task. But I do hope that in three years’ time, I will no longer have to be obliged to see my work in print; it should rather be the other way round. But even then, I will continue to blog. Like any blogger, I too dream to be an acclaimed writer swarmed by Pulitzers and Bookers. Hope and dreams, after all, know no limit called sky.