Sorry cookies. You know I love you guys. 

I'm not joking. I love cookies, but if I had to pick between an amazing cookie and an amazing comment, the comment totally wins.

Blogging can sometimes be a very selfish hobby. It's about what I feel about a book, or what book I'm waiting for, or what I think about something. It's very easy and even relaxing to blog in a bubble. When it's only about you, you have more energy. You post what you want when you want to.

I've been there and I've done that. When I first started blogging at Tantalizing Illusions, I wanted so badly to be successful. I did the popular memes, reviews and I tried to find a pretty blog design. I also did my best to know about all YA trends. I was a little insane that year. I read over 300 books. I would have sixty library books checked out at once, all stacked in precarious piles near my bed. Needless to say, I exhausted myself and didn't get the results I was looking for.

The truth, or at least what is true for me, is that pageviews matter, but in a small way compared to comments. Comments show me that someone read something and cared enough to tell me they did so. Even the shortest comment is validation because it's too easy to get fake pageviews through spam bots. 

A comment can brighten my day like nothing else in the world. It's a little bit of validation for the hours I put in to the blog. It's like, "Hey there, I'm listening. I care about what you have to say." That matters a lot to me because I have a lot of interests and likes that maybe some of my friends don't understand. I don't want to bore them with book talk, so I go to a place that appreciates my nerdiness.

I understand blogging is hard. It's the comments that always renew my interest in blogging. The little tokens of people's attention. That's why I try to comment on every blog I visit. 90% of the time, I will comment if I visit a blog because I want the blogger to know that I thought their post was interesting and worth a read. 

It's so important to me that I've tried to incorporate it into day-to-day blogging life. Right after writing/scheduling a post, editing the slider, checking the blog's Twitter account, I also make sure to visit the community. I try to comment on at least five other blogs. I try to leave meaningful comments.

I think it's up to every single blogger to help support the community and share the love of YA. Comments mean a lot to me, so I try to make sure I show some love for other bloggers too. Share the love, y'know?

Blogging can be so competitive, but the more you comment*, literally everyone wins because the community grows stronger.

*real comments. Not spam.

What do you think? How high on your list of priorities is commenting on other people's blogs? 

-P.E.