Back in the Saddle: Returning to Blogging After a Slump
Hi everyone! How have you been? I’ve been busy, tired, bored, sick, elated, and so much more, all in the past few months, and most of these feelings have been because I’m currently 6 months pregnant with my 2nd kiddo. But pregnancy wasn’t the only reason my blog has been lacking lately. I also participated in NaNoWriMo again this November, and while I didn’t “win” this year, I did spend a good amount of time writing instead of reading and blogging during the month of November.
But now I’m back and I kind of wanted to talk to you guys about slumps and how you bounce back. Sometimes we get in reading slumps, where nothing we’re reading is really grabbing us, and we just need something to wow us and hopefully we can get back into that reading saddle. Other times we get in blogging slumps where we just don’t feel like writing a review or a post or whatever, and our blogs get behind. Or maybe we just have so much going on in life that reading/blogging just isn’t as high of a priority as everything else, and so our blog suffers.
I’ve been blogging for almost 3 years now and I’ve never had this big of a slump before. Everything with my blog was going along swimmingly until I was about 2 months pregnant and started having lovely morning sickness in late July/early August. So August was pretty bare on the blog, and it was really hard for me to read while nauseated. September wasn’t any better, nor was October, and I kind of took a major break in November for NaNo. But now it’s December and my baby will be born in 3 months and I feel like if I don’t get back on track now, I never will.
Because, the thing is, I love blogging. I love the community, I love hearing about all the new awesome-sounding books that are coming out, I love fangirling on social media with all my blogger friends. I love reading, I love writing notes down while I read, and I love sharing my thoughts on books with such an awesome bookish community. It makes my day to read a comment on the blog, or to know that someone might be picking up a book and checking it out, partly because I enjoyed it. I love leaving comments on other people’s blogs and reading their reviews.
But it’s a lot of work. And when you don’t put a ton into it, you don’t get much in return. Sure, I’ve been doing this for a while so I still get comments and feedback even when I don’t put in a huge amount of effort, but I also want my blog to grow, and I want to comment more and be a bigger part of the community. And that takes a lot of work.
But blogging is a huge priority of mine, almost as big of a priority as reading. And I do believe that I’ve come to be pretty realistic about not putting too much pressure on myself when it comes to blogging. But I don’t want to stop. I never want to give this up–I love it too much. So although I may have my slumps, I always want to come back, and hopefully this time I can get back into a routine so that my next slump is in the distant, distant future.
My question for you guys: Have you had some big blogging/reading slumps in the past? Or have you ever quit blogging entirely? And if you returned to it, what were things that helped you get back into a routine where you felt like you were really truly out of your slump?
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Jess (Gone with the Words)
December 2, 2014 at 3:28 pmThis is a tough but relatable subject because we've ALL been there. For me there's no sure way of getting out of a slump. I just have to go through it. Most of the time I won't blog while in a slump, and it took me a while to be ok with that. I used to feel really guilty about it. I think blog breaks are necessary for the blogging brain, so I plan to take them as the feeling comes on. What also really helped me this year was getting co-reviewers on the blog. They've been so helpful.
L
December 2, 2014 at 6:11 pmI'm in a bit of a slump right now too, but I'm going to really try to get back on it today! And I've read several good books because of your suggestion/blog. Keep blogging! -Liz
Elizabeth Stiert
December 2, 2014 at 6:23 pmThe only solution I've found with reading slumps is to just give it time. I've tried so many books while in a slump, but really, nothing will work, so I just give it time and hope it's not going to be very long. I do also struggle with blogging, not because I feel slumpish, but because I feel like a failure and that no one reads or cares about my blog content. That just recently happened to me. I stopped for a month and a half. I'm back now because I enjoy doing it. I like writing about books I've read and other bookish posts. Also, Congrats! I'm so excited for you!
– Elizabeth @ Book YAbber
Brandi Kosiner
December 2, 2014 at 10:01 pmWhen I was preggo, I barely wanted to do any blogging, so I took a break, only writing reviews when I felt like it, it took a while after newborn stage until I was ready again
pagesunbound
December 4, 2014 at 11:58 pmI'm in a "slump" right now if you count being in grad school and barely having time to do grad school work–much less outside things like blogging. I haven't read a book that wasn't for class since the quarter started. It seems as if my only recourse will be blogging about school texts. And while I do like to do this occasionally, and it may even be helpful to force me to think about the texts, I do really miss reading for pleasure. Thankfully, I have Krysta to "carry" the blog in some ways, but I miss having time to work on it myself. Like you, I want it to grow, not just coast on the work I've already done.
That said, I'm glad to see you're back and look forward to perusing your posts whenever I decide to slack on grad school assignments *studiously ignoring looming end of quarter and seminar paper due dates*