Oh how I wish I had a dollar for every time I have sat down in front of this laptop to write a blog post for one of the 3 websites that I post content on for my brain to only go…
____________________________ I got nothing… ____________________________
Does this happen to you too? It happens to me literally all the time and it is aggravating as all get out! Hence, here I am writing about not having anything to write about. Yes, I have spreadsheets that have had other spreadsheet babies about topics and keywords that I should write about for 13Core, Can’t Speak Geek, and here at my own site but just like when I was in high school needing to write a paper about the book I just read. I sit and stare at the black space not knowing what the first words I should right should be.
What are my issues with writing a simple blog post?
Oh there are many! In no apparent order…
Brain Fog
It is real and sometimes I can’t wake my brain up enough to get the creative flow going. I don’t really do much caffeine either as I am not (gasp) a coffee drinker, nor can I do diet sodas. I live mostly off of water and rage. That first sentence can be the hardest to write and heaven forbid you try to start with making the title of the blog post be the first thing you write. We may be here all week looking at a blank screen if I am to come up with the title first.
Focus, or Rather Lack Of
Those pesky ADHD squirrels. I never have ducks and they are never in rows. My squirrels are early 2000’s ragers with house music blaring dancing with glow sticks. The never ending dings of social media notifications and emails can be a huge distraction. Then if I happen to look down at my never ending list of things that I need to accomplish, I have a tendency to start on one or three of those thinking that those have just as must priority as my content writing.
Impostor Syndrome is Real!
Sometimes the hardest part is getting out of your own way or your own brain. I have caught myself going down the rabbit hole of wonderment if I have the authority to write on a particular subject. We all have our own authority and voice for what we want to write though as we are writing it from our own viewpoints, knowledge, and experiences.
Here is some of the ways that I have gotten around this and have started writing.
Get Rid of the Distractions
Turn your computer into focus mode. Leave your cell phone in a different room. Turn off the television. Make sure your focus is 100% on your writing. Now for me, music can be good for my writing time while other times it can be distracting. If I find it becoming a distraction, I turn it off too. Another thing that helps me sometimes too is to write when there is either no one else in the house or I am the only one awake.
Make Time for your Writing
When you schedule in time for your writing, it will become more of a habit and writing will come easier. Add time for writing to your calendar and then dedicate that time to writing. You could also set a timer and say that you are going to write for exactly 30 minutes to push yourself to write more. There are also challenges on the web for publishing content each day that can help motivate you to make writing a habit.
Don’t Write In Order if You Don’t Want to
This is a big one for me actually and I started doing this actually in high school when I would have to write book reports and I found it to be very useful in my blog writing too. I will start with an outline and then fill in the paragraphs with what information is “flowing” at that time. For example, if I am writing a piece on the steps to clean a hacked website, I may start the writing off with each step but then jump into the paragraph that is about the manual review of each file on the server, then jump to resetting all of your passwords at the end, and then jump to the beginning where I say the reasons why the first thing you do is make a backup of the server before you start removing the bad code. The jumping around keeps me more engaged with writing instead of being stuck on one particular paragraph.
Get Some External Motivation
This one could be seen as a bit taboo, but it works. Before the push of AI, I used to use a service called TextBroker which is essentially a ghost writing service where you could have others to write content for you for a fee. When my writer’s block was really strong, I would often give my ideas to TextBroker and pay a fee for them to write about 400-600 word blog posts for me. Then I would take what they wrote and expand on it and put it more in my own words.
Now days I do that more with Jasper, Chat GPT, and other AI services to give me a push to start the post. I do still review everything that is written with AI, change it to my own words, and add about double the content to what “they” had written for me. I am a bit too Type A to let them do all of the writing for me (even though I do know bloggers that rely mostly on AI and that is okay too) but I want my content to be “from” me.
Sometimes You Have to Take a Break
It happens. There are just times where it does not matter how long you sit there, the words elude you. When that happens, go do something else for a while and then come back to it. Take a walk, eat a snack, get a drink, do something that either your brain or you body needs for you to do so that you can refocus later.
If you ever feel you are alone in your writer’s block, trust me you are not. It will also not last forever. I hope these tricks help you if you ever find yourself in a place where the creativity takes a nap on you. Please let me know your favorite ways to rid yourself of writer’s block.
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