Blogging When You Don’t Want to Blog

(Image from Problogger.net)

It’s been well over a week now that I have not written a new blog post and it gnaws on my conscience more and more each day.

So right now I write this post with mental mind-set of “I really DON’T want to blog today”.

And it is not that I don’t like blogging, either.  Rather, I am just distracted with other things and the “chore” of writing a blog seems quite painful.

Yet, I still write today.  My conscience got the better of me and that social media bug that lives in my mind say “enough is enough”.

So I write a post about not wanting to write.

But I do have a point here!  (A few actually)  And while I sat in my bed this morning pondering what I was going to blog about today, I felt that this was a good lesson in itself.

Here is my logic today for NOT blogging and reasons WHY I am actually doing it!

Why I Don’t Want to Blog Today:

I’m preoccupied, in a good manner.  I’ve been working for about a week on a new project (it is a new Facebook application I am developing and it is going to be AWESOME!).  My excitement is high, but putting it together has required a bit of time and focus.

I have plenty of “auto-generating” money sources to keep the cash-flow alive and the use of dedicated freelancers and outsourcing partners allows me to remove myself from the “internet marketing mindset”…at least for a week or so.

And I have found that being out of the “Zone”, in this case: internet marketing practice, I frankly don’t have anything to talk about in that field.

Essentially, I am focused on other things and I can’t think about what I should write.

(Sounds like a familiar problem…especially for those of your just starting a blog or wanting to start a blog.)

That is No Excuse

I woke up this morning fairly angry that I have not made the effort to do my weekly blog.  Really, it only takes about 20 minutes to get up a simple written blog (video blogs take a little longer…about 45 minutes).  So time should not be an excuse.

But what to write?

This is where I think I have been ignoring my own advice and making an excuse for something that is not real.  Sure, there is this inherent pressure to write blogs that are going to “blow away” my readers and hopefully revolutionize blogging as we know it.  That thought of getting on page one of Digg or getting your post re-tweeted 1000 times drives many of us to really write a “kick-ass blog”.

I think that mentality is good, too.  Aim for quality!  Aim to innovation and new thoughts!

BUT don’t require it.

I’ve gone through these funks before and they will not only hurt your blog and your social presence, it will hurt your desire to write.

And sometimes the blog posts that were really about nothing (kind of like this post!) blows up while that post that you are sure is going to break the Google Alert system bombs.  That is kind of what makes blogging great.

Make Yourself Blog!

Again, I don’t think I am going to win any blogging awards for today’s post, but it serves some important needs:

It keeps you consistent! That is probably the most important thing about blogging.

• Your readers will expect it -  that is critical from a social marketing aspect.
• The search engines will expect it - that is critical for search engine rankings
• You should expect it! - habits are important and ignoring just one week’s of blogs can derail your desire to continue.

So if today is your “blogging day” and you just don’t want to do it, neither did I.  But I made it and I feel better about it, too.

Need something to write about?  Write a response to this blog!  Tell me why you like or dislike writing!  Tell me that I am great or that I am out of my mind!  And if you don’t want to write about my blog, find someone else’s post and write about it.  That is the EASIEST way of getting ideas while creating some incredible social marketing leverage (with the backlink or trackback!)

cheers…matt