Over the Easter
Holiday, I had a nice but long chat with my mom (and sister) about lifestyle bloggers,
their very glossy websites and their Instagram
feed. My mom was more than irritated and definitely needed to blow off steam. So I
let her tell me exactly how she felt about some of the blogs I have introduced to her over the years. She even felt the need to tell me that my blog needed more
love but thankfully excused my lagging and reminded me of what my priorities
should be--work and school first, blog second!
But here is the deal,
my blog is important to me, I may start researching and writing posts the week
before (or even at eleven the night before) but I love being here and
establishing connections and relationships with fellow bloggers and my audience.
I consider myself a blogaholic, work breaks are for donning over outfit posts,
monthly beauty hauls and home renovations, I can’t help but think about
rearranging my living room. While the blog is a part of me, the job and school
come first, they have too. I often feel I don’t have the time, energy or funds
to curate this space into the polished and perfect website you see with other
blogs. Then again, I am more about the content and listening to what my
followers want to read. I love promoting my favorite lipsticks (from Maybelline
to Tom Ford), the perfect white tank top and marketing brands that I actually wear
and like. Above all else I especially love indulging in girl talk, I try to
portray the real and flawed person that I am. When my mom felt the need to
explode and go off on women I really like, she told me she was tired of the inauthentic posts, the fact that these bloggers think they can relate with their
audience and the assumed entitlement. Honestly, I am too! I often have feelings
of inadequacy for not having an apartment in a big city with high end
furniture, traveling every other month, housing the most impressive library
you have ever seen or sporting around in head to toe Lululemon sportswear and maintaining a wardrobe that includes two
or three pairs of Valentino shoes and Chanel purses galore. I am not tiny, I
can barely cook and my home space is far from picture perfect.
Aspirations and
expectations have become exhausting, why in the world do I hold myself to other
people’s expectations and not my own? When and why did I set my rule book aside
and turn to others? The bloggers, who have remained true from the beginning,
continue to inspire and motivate me but at the end of the day I am who I am,
and they are who they are. Their blogs are surely pretty (and successful) but
that’s all you get, what about the flaws, the truth, the hard work, the reality
behind those pictures. I want to see and learn about the real you and the mess
you hide behind the camera! I definitely appreciate all these things (the fashion, the
homes and the overpriced nail polish as any other girl) and still look up to
those who have certainly earned their success. I am done with those who complain for no
reason (hello you live in Manhattan, travel the world, have created your own job
and seem healthy. I would certainly like to go to yoga and meet with friends
for lunch everyday), feel entitled just because of who you are and those
who lie about being self-made.
Here at Sit and Stay Awhile, I believe in
honesty and being real with my readers. I define flawless as being ok with who
I am and where I am at in my life right now. And at this moment, I’m a twenty
seven years old, not married and live with a roommate. I finally landed a full
time job that I love, creativity in the kitchen is a fail more often than not
so a salad or soup is dinner most nights and two weeks ago I went home and kind
of broke down to my parents because I am exhausted from being a grad student
and working full time. If you have made it this far, I applaud you for reading
the novel this post has turned into, thank you for listening and sticking
around. What are your feeling with lifestyle bloggers ? Who are you favorites and why? Who
do you despise and why?
