Blogging Mindset: Why I Only Take a Few Calls a Year |

September 23, 2026 blogging tips 🕑 5 minutes read

Cruising down Venice Beach California.

Do you want to get to know me better?

Readers ask me to share the “day in a life of a blogger” type posts frequently.

Here ya go per your request.

Welcome to the world of Ryan Biddulph.

Someone asked me – again – to get on the phone to chat earlier today. I field phone requests from time to time. Individuals want to set up a call to chat with me. But I guard my time. People who take the time to build a relationship with me figure that one out, pronto.

I use my phone for calls a few times a year.

Why?

My blog does most of the work.

I consistently work on my blog. My blog behaves for me like an asset.

Do you want to know what’s on my mind? Visit my blog. I share my blogging tips thoughts through 700 plus blog posts. I answer blogging FAQ’s thoroughly. Everything is on my blog.

Do you have personal motives outside of my thoughts?

If you do….this is why I only take a few calls each year. 🙂

My blog is the phone. Comments are your calls. But comments need to be genuine or else I do not approve comments. Phone calls need to be legit. No spam. No business pitches. I approve authentic comments. I trash everything else.

Who do I take calls from?

My dad. We chat via my phone sometimes. We often chat through Facebook. That’s it though.

Reach out to me via:

email
X
Facebook
LinkedIn
Mastodon
Blue Sky

if you prefer not to drop a Blogging From Paradise Dot Com comment. I happily reply to all blogging-related questions I get to. I cannot guarantee a reply there because I do not own those sites. I can guarantee a reply here to genuine blog comments because I own my blog. I check every comment. After all, this is my blogging home.

I do not reply to all phone calls / comments here because most seem to be spam.

What Motivated Me to Not Take But a Few Phone Calls a Year?

I worked a few corporate jobs before becoming an entrepreneur.

Working in the corporate world alerted me to something: most jobs entail wasting hours on the phone doing pointless stuff. People typically try to steal time from other people through meaningless phone calls. I did plenty of business through the phone. I also wasted cumulative weeks going back and forth on calls with no real purpose advancing the company or myself through my professional career.

Don’t get me started about corporate meetings. For every meaningful meeting truly helpful to the group, we wasted hours going over stuff best sent in short memos via email.

I vowed to never waste time on my phone before I bought my domain and hosting.

But making that vow came with a price.

I built my blog into an asset that answered all possible blogging questions one would lob my way via a phone call.

This took time, effort and quite a bit of patience. I cannot say it was easy but it was worth it.

My blog is my phone. Drop a comment. Ring me. Make sure it’s legit or I will not call back.

Even better?

Instead of wasting our collective time on a phone call I cyber answer your question:

on your schedule
in seconds or minutes (however long it takes to get your question answered through my blog posts, eBooks for sale or online course for sale)

I Love People But Hate Wasting Time

I love people.

Why else would I give 18 years of my life serving people through blogging?

I hate wasting time.

Phone calls waste time in most cases. Not because people are a waste of time. But because people who want to get me to become their customer or client waste my time. People also waste time gossiping. People also waste time by not getting to the point.

Stern Wack Pack Whack Job Teaches Me a Valuable Lesson

Years ago I received an email from someone I deemed a semi-celebrity.

He was a member of the Howard Stern Whack Pack.

He cold pitched me an interview opportunity. I felt flattered because I was a big fan of the Howard Stern radio – and TV – show in the 80’s and 90’s. He was over the top for me sometimes but Howard’s brand of humor made me laugh.

Anyway, this individual was quite funny on the show. I broke my rule, replied to his cold pitch and broke another rule (that I never broke again) by giving him my phone number.

He called me back. We chatted.

We set up an interview time after bullshitting on the phone for a bit. Again; I gave him slack because I loved him on the show.

So he interviews me. We make gold together over 90 minutes. I am excited. I cannot wait for him to publish it. I will blast the hell out of it for my tribe. Woohoo!

Four hours later he sends me a text message:

“I listened to the 90 minutes. Love it! Now after you pay the $125 fee we can do the real one. When do you want to chat again?”

What?

As you guys likely know by now, I have seen every trick in the cold pitch book. I am ruthlessly eagle-eyed. Never once did he make any mention of a:

free trial interview
a $125 fee for the actual interview

He lied. But he tried to behave like he did not lie.

I thanked him for his time politely but said I was not interested.

Desperately, he followed up with the same pitch. I blocked his phone number. Desperately, he began pitching me emails saying the same thing. I blocked his email address.

After feeling a little pissed off I thought it was funny; this guy that I viewed as pretty much a celeb was sucking my knee caps. I chuckled. Life is weird. I’m telling the celeb to get lost. Funny.

But he taught me a clear lesson: answer everything through your blog so you never need to use your phone (to take calls) again.

Build an asset that works for you.