What I Learned From Taking a Blogging Break

I’ve really backed away from blogging in the past several months. The reason? Quite frankly, I felt that I had run out of things to say. Pair that with being overloaded with other projects, including writing projects, and I guess I just wandered away from it.

For me, it was a healthy break, something that I think I needed after 9 years of consistently posting here. 9 years! In that time I’ve learned so much, made so many new connections, and grown my business. I owe a lot of my success to what I’ve done here. It’s been an interesting thing, walking away. Here’s what I have figured out as a result.

I missed it like crazy. I really do miss blogging, a lot. But I felt as if my creative well had dried up. I really didn’t know what else I could say that would resonate with you. But I craved the process of writing and just hitting publish. I missed producing. And I’m glad to be back.

I felt “out of the loop”.  Through my blog I’ve been able to connect with people from around the world. People would stop by to leave comments, or they’d tweet me, or email me to talk about what I’d written. The conversations were rich and the connections were strong. When I stopped blogging I lost all that. I really did. I know the gurus don’t like it when people say “if you build it, they will come” but I think that if you write it, and it’s good, and it resonates with people, they WILL come, and they will stick around. I removed myself from the conversation and the conversation went on without me. I didn’t like that feeling.

I stopped listening. One of the primary ways to get ideas for blog posts is to listen. Monitor your Twitter feed, and your blog feeds. Read voraciously. Attend webinars. I stopped making time to do those things and the ideas dried up. Listening is by far the most important thing you can do if you want to produce great content consistently. Now that I’m listening on a daily basis again, I can feel my well filling up with new ideas for me to explore.

All in all, I didn’t mind walking away from my blog for as long as I did. It allowed me to explore other things, tackle some new projects and try stuff out. But I’m glad to be back at it. I know it is good for my soul and good for business.

And to you, dear reader, I appreciate you stopping by, for taking the time out of your day to spend a few minutes with me. I hope to continue to provide value to you. Welcome back!