My last blog post was on April 1st. What’s that six or seven weeks ago? And the gap between my last and second to last blog post was another month and a half. Prior to that my posts were written in monthly intervals.
I’ve had ‘write a blog post’ in my planning journal for many weeks but all I do on a Monday morning is to move the post-it task from the previous week onto my fresh to do list. I swear to myself that I’ll write a blog post this week but I never do.
So what’s going on? Why am I procrastinating on my blog?
My blog is probably one of my most important places I have on the Internet. It is my online home. A place where I can direct people. A place where readers, potential clients and a community can get to know me and my work. A place where I can express myself in as many words as I like.
It’s not like I don’t have anything to say - I have plenty. I could’ve written about my membership club or about my free ebook called the Little Book of Impact. I could’ve written about my thoughts and feelings behind the launch of my first paid workbook. There was a host of feelings to mine there. I could’ve written about how I’ve grown my mailing list or how anxiety has led to me feeling overwhelmed. Or how I’ve re-thought the projects I’d previously decided on for this quarter.
But I just didn’t feel the urge. It didn’t appeal to me.
I held an online workshop for members of the membership club and in there I answered a question from one of the Club members about blogging: “Should I start the blog now when I don’t know what theme it will be? Or wait until I know? And if I do change its theme should I restart the blog from scratch?”
My advice was to start now, to write about anything and everything they wanted. All those things that you wish to voice and put out there into the world. A blog is the perfect place to get better as a writer, to find your writing voice and to discover what you are passionate about when it comes to writing.
“A blog is the perfect place to get better as a writer, to find your writing voice and to discover what you are passionate about about when it comes to writing.”
Don’t tailor your blog for an audience, I replied. You’re a creative, a writer. You have things you want to write. If you try and second guess what your audience wants you could freeze. Get writer’s block. And not produce anything. And don’t worry about re-starting from scratch if you do come across a theme. Keep it to show your progress, how far you’ve come.
And yet I wasn’t following my own advice.
I think the problem started when I decided to turn my writing into a business. Naturally I turned to the Internet for advice. The Internet can be brilliant. But the advice given for some business owners might not necessarily be right for me or you (including this blog post!).
First and foremost I am a writer and a creative. Secondly I am a business owner and a mentor. But as soon as you look for advice about being a business owner you are encouraged to ‘serve your audience’.
‘What does your audience want to hear from you'?’ you’re asked. So you start thinking about that - forgetting that you are a writer who loves to write from the heart. My heart. Second guessing my audience makes me freeze up. It takes the passion I have for writing away.
And I think this is a problem a lot of creatives and writers have. The information out there is for business owners who want to grow their business - but for us as writers and creatives first and business owners second this advice goes against our creative instincts, values and desires.
So we become blocked. We struggle to find our writing passions. We struggle to find our writing voice. We’re too busy thinking about an audience that we forget about who we are primarily writing for.
Ourselves.
As Elizabeth Gilbert says in her book, Big Magic: ‘If I’d sat down to write Eat Pray Love with the sole aim of helping others, I would’ve produced an entirely different book.’
She didn’t start writing Eat Pray Love with the intention to save the world with her creativity. She wrote it for herself. But by doing so she inspired thousands.
“I’ve been trying to ‘save the world’ with my creativity because that’s what the algorithms demand of me.”
I’ve been trying to ‘save the world’ with my creativity because that’s what the algorithms demand of me. Because that’s what the Internet advice tells me to do. They say I have to niche myself. That’s how an audience finds you. That’s how the algorithms know how to pigeonhole you.
Very slowly and subtly I have been changing the way I think about this blog and my writing. I’ve been thinking about what people want to hear from me instead of writing from my heart. I’ve been thinking I need to stick to a certain theme on here with my blog to keep it consistent - instead of allowing myself to use this as a space to write about whatever I want.
I’ll probably write about writing, creativity and confidence anyway because that’s my passion - that’s what I love to muse over and think about. But by telling myself I only could write about that I had no interest in writing anything. My brain can be incredibly stubborn.
So in conclusion my creative chums if you’re struggling to find your writing voice, your writing passions, a theme for your blog, if you’re creatively blocked - then I suggest (but I’m not telling you!) that you take the pressure off and just write for yourself. Be your own audience. Remove those shackles of how best to serve your audience - and just write to work out how the world works from your own perspective and for the simple enjoyment of writing.
“If I’d sat down to write Eat Pray Love with the sole aim of helping others, I would’ve produced an entirely different book.”
If you enjoyed this post:
If you feel really unconfident when it comes to your writing or creativity I have a Membership club called The Confident Creative Club. This is a gentle, friendly group where we analyse and work on our creative mindset blocks in conjunction with taking action on our projects. This won’t just be a place to learn but to push forward with our creative goals and make real progress.
I write about journaling and how it can help reach your creative goals in my recently published workbook, called Journaling Your Goals. It can help you find your creative purpose and to become more productive, more motivated and less scared. To find out more and to order then click here.
I also write tiny essays in my newsletter which I send out about twice a month.
