I received a call earlier from a friend, who is also a fellow blogger. After years of giving free information to her blog’s community, she added a relevant advertisement to the sidebar of her blog.
Seems reasonable, right?
Well, it turns out she was emailed by a reader, who is also a blogger. He called her everything from a sell-out to a hypocrite. He hated that she now had this small ad on the site. She has over 7,000 RSS subscribers and his was the only complaint in the 3 weeks since she added the 250 X 250 ad. I suggested she check his blog out. It was a poorly-written, amateur looking blog, which hadn’t been updated since June 2010!
Trolls are gonna troll!
In my experience, one of the defining characteristics of people who seem to be going nowhere, is that they waste their time dishing out advice to others, rather than working on their own challenges. They are happier to piss all over your parade, rather than build something of value themselves. They choose to get their kicks by throwing stones at those with the attributes they lack, rather than working on their own personal or professional development.
The bottom line: Don’t allow these vocal, yet typically inept, people to get in the way of your goals or dreams. In fact, their very presence is often a good indicator of your own success!