Looking back through my recent posts, I snubbed my own nose at the laziness of my entries. Certainly, posting the contents of a chain letter/SPAM was another Blog 365 copout. My tale of Banana Robbery wasn’t much better (although cute). It was one of those nights when I felt that I must have something to say, but just couldn’t find the right words. I refused to sleep until I had posted a real entry for the day.
I sat in bed writing down whatever thoughts came into my mind, and then promptly deleted all that I had written. As usual, YaYa looked over my shoulder and offering his critique. Realizing that I was self-conscious of my own son, I kept telling him to roll over and go to sleep. He didn’t…so I finally just gave in and we worked on his blog instead.
I know that it is odd for a 9 year old to have his own blog. I let him start one with the hopes that it would help him learn the craft of organizing his thoughts to ultimately become a better writer. Although his participation in Blog 365 seems to push the demands over the top, I assure you that he *wanted* to do it. I even tried to talk him out of it. YaYa takes his participation seriously. He may not publish a post everyday, but he takes pride that has an entry for every day of the year so far. And, even though he doesn’t type the entries, I still think that he is learning a lot about writing. He certainly has an eye for missing commas. I like to think of it as another part of his education. For him, it is a way to stay close to me and his Dad.
It wasn’t until YaYa examined his finished product, carefully checking that every day had an entry, noting the animal of the day, the phase of the moon, and the number of visitors that have hit his site, that he finally rolled over and fell fast asleep. It was then, that my thoughts finally came to me.
Now it’s your turn: I am sure that you all have experienced writer’s block on one occasion or another. What do you do? Do you just let it go or are you, like me, determined to somehow find the words? Do tell?
Well this is no help to you except to say that I admire your effort. I run every single day of the year, and I can guarentee that it is a lot easier to run every day than to publish something every day. And some of the running days are much easier than others. And so it should be with your writing!
Well you know I gave up on the every day blogging thing. I find that when I have writers block something ridiculous usually comes out (like last night). I find if I wait and think about it rather then rushing to push the post button time will help me formulate my thoughts.
I let it go. I knew I couldn’t post everyday, and that it would be added pressure I didn’t need, so I didn’t even attempt 365. I’m finding it hard to comment on all the posts of those that do!
I try something different — writing at a different time or a different place. Sometimes a good long meditative run does the trick. Then the problem is getting home in time to write down all those great thoughts.
I’m kind of lazy. I let it go unless it has been a long time since I posted and then I try to think of something that either was entertaining or that I can make sound entertaining.
I keep a virtual post-it note on my Blackberry that has ideas on it that I can blog about. Ideas come to me at different times and places and I note them on my Blackberry.
When I can’t think of what to blog about, I check the ideas on my Blackberry and then just start typing. Usually it starts out pretty mundane and it gets changed multiple times but eventually it shapes into a worthy blog post.
i am determined to find the words. i can work a post over and over and over till i feel its just right. but there is a point at which i realize i am trying too hard, and it just isn’t there and i need to let it go.
oh, so the secret is a blackberry! no wonder!
what do i do? Well, you can see the results. I post a dumb e-card. I whine. I write about how to make tea.
I’m not trying to post every day (thank GOD!), but I AM trying to practice my writing, so I don’t like to let too much time go by…but some of my posts are just lame, and do nothing for my writing or for my readers.
Sometimes I just want to write for ME. But that would really shut down my place, but fast.
I just keep trying to put one foot (finger?) in front of the other.
I’m TOTALLY impressed that your posts are so substantive. and i didn’t know yaya was doing it too! now that’s impressive!
I sort of feel like I cheat when I have a blogging block, especially for blogging for an entire year. I’ll resort to such tactics as memes or those silly surveys that tell you what kind of shoe you are. I’ve been posting every day but some days it’s just flat out hard. I feel like I’ve lost readers — not that I had anything important to say, but I haven’t seen a lot of familiar readers in a long while.