Here in this article, I am going to discuss the usual symptoms, reasons of blogger's block, how to overcome it and how to stay away from it after that.
Are you a blogger who is undergoing a so called 'blogger's block'? Are you someone who is wondering if you have the symptoms of blogger's block? Or are you just someone who is fascinated by the idea of blogger's block? Maybe you are someone who just wanted to read about 'blogger's block? Or did you just search the term 'blogger's block' and finally landed here?
Whatever maybe your reason to be here, I am going to introduce you to a person who had blogger's block and how he managed to overcome it. Read on to know more about it.
But before that, the customary statutory warning : The incident described here is based on a true story. Due to having not much of decency and moral obligations, the name of the characters and other details of the incidence are not changed, altered or modified. They are represented here as it is. Now you may read on.
Once upon a time, there was a travel blogger whose name was 'Trablogger' who never wrote anything related to travel after a certain point of time; not due to lack of travel stories or photographs from the travels, but just because he became plain lazy. In other words, he had a chronic blogger's block!
Yes, the person who had blogger's block is yours truly!
Since you have got introduced to this guy, let us go deep inside our main issue. Let us look at the symptoms, reasons and then the solution.
You have a story ready in mind, you have all the necessary supporting contents like photographs also ready with you, but not feel like sitting down to write down that story?
Maybe you are at the initial stages of blogger's block.
You just came back from a trip, you have many pictures, maybe too many of them, but you don’t want to spend your time finding the best one to come up with a story?
Maybe you have crossed the initial stages and you are getting the blogger's block
You stared at the blank screen for some time and stared at it some more time and still no words were coming. You typed something and didn’t feel good about it, deleted the whole thing retyped and deleted again and went back to the staring process again. Sounds familiar?
Maybe it's time to confirm that you have blogger's block
Procrastination is the word that we all bloggers have to be aware of. When we start to procrastinate things, it is a good sign that we are losing the excitement we used to get from blogging.
I used to read a lot of blogs, travel related or others and used to actively participate in discussions. But those days seem to me like ages ago (if you want to call two years with some exaggerations). Those were my initial years of travel blogging. I started my travel blog 'trablogger.com' on the first day of September 2014. The frequency of posting, reading others blogs, participating in their discussion and all such blog related activities were at its peak during the first six months. It continued with similar or maybe a bit lesser intensity during the first two years before I got busy with my life outside of blogging world. And it never got better. It was the beginning of my blogger's block.
Now let us look at some of the reasons.
Why do bloggers get this block?
I think the most common reason for people to go away from the blog, is the busy life they have outside the blogging life. Their priorities change. Their focus shifts to something else that they think is more important.
When I started my blogging journey, I was there actively on my blog almost 24x7. I used to reply to other blogger's comment instantly, to an extent of having a long 'commentversation'. Also, I used to read most of the post that came to my WP reader feed.
When I got busy with things outside the blog world, as a first sign of blogger's block, my active reading of other's blog post came down, along with it my active blog participation as well. Commentversations became just comments. Slowly that too died. What remained was the Mundane Monday challenge, a weekly event which I still host on my blog that encourages one to be more mindful and make beautiful photographs of mundane subjects.
Yes, it happens at times. Making a great blog post is hard-work. However rewarding it might be, everyone will reach a point where they secretly wish to take a break. During one of those lazy moments, one decides to take a very small break. That very small break can make or break your blogging journey. Some get more inspired ideas during that break. Some others like me get the taste of being lazy on the blog and it breaks the momentum they once had. Slowly the good old friend, 'procrastination' joins the lazy blogger. And the 'block' gets a good starting point.
If what my teacher told me was correct, I think Mr. Isaac Newton agrees with me. Once you lost your momentum or the blogging rhythm (If you have one), it is very hard to get back to it. At least it is true in my case. I had almost everything ready for a post, but posts are waiting to be written in my mind or waiting to be published on my drafts. That happens when the partners in crime - Laziness and Procrastination kills the momentum.
Most of the time, our own beloved blog readers help you out to get back on track. Many times I wanted to stop my weekly event since it was too much of a work for a lazy procrastinating blogger called Trablogger. But then my well wishers came with encouraging comments asking me to continue it. I am thankful to them for keeping my blog activities alive even though it was once in a week.
At times we get disheartened by looking at the stats. For us what we write is a masterpiece. When our masterpiece post doesn’t get the much-needed appreciation we tend to lose the interest. This is true in every area of life, not only in blogging.
Yes, sometimes people get saturated with all the likes and appreciation. When I started off I used to check my stats almost every hour to check how many visitors, how many of them are unique visitors, which all countries are they from, how many new likes etc. But after a certain stage, I lost interest in such statistics. This is one type of saturation
Another way of getting saturation is knowing the futility of this digital world. Yes, your opinions are valued, your voice is heard and appreciated in this virtual world. But at times bloggers including myself are way too nice. They never say anything bad about anyone's post. All they have is words of encouragement only. Encouragement is necessary, of course. But sometimes it gets us thinking, am I really doing good, do I have anything worth sharing. This doubt can also make one stay away from blogging.
There can be many other reasons too, which can cause a blogger's block. But enough talking about how it intrudes into one's blogging life. I know, if you are reading this, you want to know how to overcome this block. So let's look at some of the remedies to our problem.
Yes, the first step to overcome blogger's block is to push oneself to write that first post after a long while. Are thinking that "Did I come here to read this??!"
I know it is not as easy as it sounds. If you could push yourself to write something, there wouldn’t be any blogger's block at all in the first place! We are talking about a situation when you are having that block.
Push yourself to write when there is the slightest spark of inspiration.
Then Write something that is close to your heart. Usually, such topics don't take much effort.
You were writing about things close to your heart all the time before the block?
Then Write about something that you know very well.
You have already depleted those topics too?
Then write about yourself or your opinion on something relevant or irrelevant.
Is it too hard to find such topics?
Then Write about Blogger's block itself. See how I did!
You have to start at some point in order to remove the block. You have to attack the lack of momentum with the power of impulse. When you have a nudge from within, act on it. Start writing and you will see how the idea develops. You can use the above points as a pointer to kickstart your first post.
I have done exactly the same with this post. Trablogger was a travel blogger who didn't write anything about travels for more than 60 weeks. My last travel related post was Lessons Taught By The Mountain | A Chamundi Hill Story which I had posted on April 2016! So I had to start at some point. And here it is, a post on how to overcome chronic blogger's block!
It is quite a hard-work to go against the flow all alone. So get some support. When you make a public announcement, you create a social pressure. When you tell everyone that you are going to do something and you don’t do it, someone might ask you, why you didn’t do it even after telling everyone. Social pressure was the only reason for me to continue the Mundane Monday Challenge, something that I have done for more than 123 weeks at this point of time.
If you want another example of how to create a social pressure, here it goes.
The name is Reflections. It will be a new category on my blog. If you want you can call it Sunday reflections. I might call it Sunday Random Reflections. I will be posting my random reflections, like what you are reading now, on every Sunday. Do come and check this space and create some social pressure for me, so that I can completely overcome my blogger's block!
In blog world give and take policy works quite fine. If you want appreciation, go and give some honest appreciation. You are sure to receive some blog love in return and that too in multiplied quantity. If you think that you are not getting enough appreciation, maybe you can even ask shamelessly.
Don’t know how? It looks something like this.
If you like what you have read so far please share it on your social media accounts. If you really liked it you can even say hi to me at my Facebook page and Instagram page where I usually share my travel pictures and videos.
By writing something that is close to your heart or something that easy for you to write and by capitalizing on that impulse, you will be somehow able to overcome your blogger's block. If you still think that you need more ideas, I'll have to brainstorm.
Listicles are articles with a list, such as top 10 things to do.
If you have a travel blog, make a list of top 10 travel movies to watch or travel literature to read.
If you have a personal blog, make a list of books you like, quotes that caught your attention and so on.
Top 10 things that no one knows about you, top 10 secrets of your life; such topics sound quite interesting from the title itself. Let me know if you write any of those. If you still cant find a topic, just make a list of blogs which you follow that you think others should follow too.
Ask questions related to your blog topic. The other blogger can also do a return interview and it is a win-win situation. So you both have something unique to post and miraculously it removes the blogger's block.
Joining a blog challenge is one of the easiest ways to get yourself unblocked. Photo challenges are great too. Dailypost from WordPress gives you prompts to write a blog post on a daily basis. You can also join the Mundane Monday challenge that I host on every Monday.
I hope these tips and tricks will help you to get your blogger's block removed. So I optimistically believe that it's been removed from your blogging world.
Now what?
Maintaining momentum means, you keep on posting on your blog unique contents on a regular basis. Creating unique good content can be a daunting task after a certain time. Creative ideas can run out, causing a break in your streak. So you need to have a plan to maintain your continuity.
If you picked up some sub topic of your main topic and you have a lot more to say, break it down into smaller blog posts and create a series out of it. The attention span of people is quite less, especially while reading a blog post, especially when one comes across hundreds of new blog posts every day. The shorter the better. But not too short and not too long. A blog post of 300 to 500 words would be optimum.
If you think you have a cool idea that you want to share with others, you can host a blog event. It could be a weekly poetry corner, photography challenge or even Mundane Monday challenge. For more ideas check out WordPress blog events.
If you think you want to find unique content in your chosen area all by yourself according to your choice of theme, create your own theme and come up with great blog posts. It could be anything that you fancy. I am fancying Sunday Reflections, Mundane Monday challenges, Travel Tuesday, Wednesday World, Throwback Thursday, Photography Friday, Saturday Stories, if you are looking for some examples or inspiration.
So I guess you are all set to overcome your blogger's block and start plunging back into the blogging world like I did with this post. Now you know How I overcame my blogger's block with this post. Thank you in advance for encouraging me with your inspiring comments. Also, thank you in advance for sharing more ideas on how to unblock oneself from the blogger's block
Did you ever experience blogger's block? If so how did you overcome it? Tell me what did you do when you had undergone this phase. Please share your ideas on how to overcome a blogger's block.
You might also want to know 10 blogging lessons I've learned in 3 years.