Comment by alp1n3_eth

I write mainly for myself, but it has other benefits as well. The act of blogging forces me to actually follow through with pieces, as I'm putting them out there. If I'm just "taking notes", it won't be as well laid out (at least until later revisions) and is very utilitarian.

Blogging forces myself to write for others, which allows me to do things like research a subject more deeply and include supporting evidence. Aside from that, it's nice to have a resource that shows enthusiasm about a field, and there are things you can point to if writing samples are necessary for a job, grant, or publication.

I think there are a lot of other benefits I haven't covered. I will preface this saying all of my blogs are also first drafts about random things. Sometimes they align with my field, but a lot of the time they are edge-cases or in an adjacent field, and sometimes they're just ramblings about random topics. Finding your reason to blog is the best way to do it, because if you have no reason or motivation to, why do it?