my blogging struggles
This post is related to a post that I saw on the Discovery feed yesterday: Our blogging struggles, and one of the "answers" to it (my blogging struggles). I've been thinking about restarting the blog after an extended time of inactivity, so I think this could be a good opportunity to reflect on some of the things that made me stop last time.
1. Running out of steam
Last year, when I started writing on Bear Blog, I was really excited about it. So excited that, for some time, I posted almost daily. But eventually I ran out of steam. I was expecting that to happen eventually, and I told myself that it was fine, that I could just slow down my activity ... but after I had set such a high bar early on, I just didn't feel like continuing after a while. Looking back, I think it's important to keep a steady pace, but not overdo it. It keeps the self-imposed pressure down.
2. The blog VS my notebooks / journal
I keep quite a few notebooks and a personal journal. Sometimes, when writing a post, I find myself asking "does this really have to be a blog post? I could just make some notes in my notebook and not have to worry about presentation or typos..."
Maybe it's because I keep a personal journal, but I also don't like it when the posts start feeling too much like diary entries. That's why I've since gone back and deleted quite a few of the old entries. It can be hard to draw the line between personal writing and something that gets put "out there".
3. Self-imposed conceptual constraints
I've always been interested in design in general. I enjoy creating concepts, symbols or logos, thinking about what they represent, and making things feel cohesive and consistent through visuals or editing. I also love discovering blogs that feel well-designed and have a unifying concept or theme.
However, this kind of preference for consistency also has its downsides. When I first started this blog, I treated is as some kind of experimental space where I could just do whatever I felt like. And it was like this for the first few weeks or so. But then I came up with a "proper" name, a theme, a logo ... and I got too caught up in thinking about what I should post, what fit the image / "brand" that I had created in my head, instead of enjoying the creative freedom.
I still dream of keeping a blog or online presence where everything has its place and beautifully fits into a wider guiding concept. But the issue of needlessly over-constraining myself is definitely one that I have to keep in mind.
4. The audience
This is somewhat related to point 2. One of the key characteristics of blogging is that your posts can be seen by others. Even if I try to "not think about it too hard" or "just write for myself", the thought of the audience keeps creeping back into my mind. I start thinking that I should write in a more audience-friendly style, or choose topics that others would like to read about. And then there's the statistics part. Bear Blog is very minimalist, but it still has an "upvote" feature. So when one post "does better" than another, I start thinking that I should do more posts like it and get disappointed when a new post (seemingly) gets no attention at all.
In part, this kind of thinking is a side effect of our social media-dominated modern attention economy. But to a certain degree, I think it's also just human nature. Even before the internet, people generally liked it when things they made got positive attention. And it can be motivating, too. But, at least in the realm of personal blogging, it's important to always stay aware of the line between what I want to do and what I think others want me to do, and not leaning too hard towards the latter.
Conclusion
Summarizing all the points, my biggest issue is that I constrain myself too much by getting caught up in my own thoughts about the blog's concept, update frequency, or the intended audience. This year, I'll try going with a more balanced approach.