Ask geekmummy: Help! I’ve lost my blogging mojo

I’m a little late with my “Ask geekmummy” column this month, because I’ve been struggling to find a question to answer. I must confess that I’ve recently been feeling a little weary of “blogging about blogging” and talking about blogging, and I’ve been trying to take some “me” time to refocus on my blogging activities.

It seems I’m not alone. Some very high profile bloggers like Crystal Jigsaw and Not Supermum have also written in the last month or so about their blogging fatigue. It seems that there’s so much that you can do with blogging and social media that it’s very easy to get overwhelmed by the whole thing, and that’s when burnout can strike. There are many bloggers around who will quite cheerfully tell you the “rules” of blogging, and those rules are different depending on who you talk to. Should you be worrying about SEO? Going self hosted? Google+? Where are you in the rankings? How many comments did your last blog post get?

Does it really matter?

Here’s what I do when I’m starting to feel overwhelmed, because yes, it happens to us all. I take a piece of paper and a pen (I know, how retro!), and I write down WHY I blog. Why did I start blogging, and why do I blog now, and what do I want to get out of blogging in the future. And then I take a cold hard look at whatever it is that’s stressing me out, and I consider whether it’s something I really need to worry about.

I would be very surprised if many bloggers actually started blogging to get to the top of the rankings, or to get a certain number of hits per day. I predict that most people started because they love writing, sharing stories, preserving memories. Trying new things might feature in there too. Perhaps trying to earn a little extra money? Everyone’s reasons will be different, and they’re all equally valid. But you know what, once you have written down why you blog, it’s a heck of a lot easier to work out what you should be spending your time doing.

If you really feel that you’re losing your blogging mojo, why not try something different? Try not blogging for a week, write a guest post for someone else’s blog, start a new blog or try audio or video blogging. I’ve been delighted to learn recently that Crystal Jigsaw is back after her short break, and that Not Supermum has started a new blog. Both these bloggers found their mojo again, and if you feel like you’ve lost your mojo perhaps trying one of those things will help you too.

For some bloggers, blogging is their job. But for many others blogging is something we started for fun. And it’s very easy along the way to lose that fun, and to have it become more like work, and this is what makes you feel like you’ve lost your mojo. The best way to get yourself out of that funk is to do something different and rediscover the fun in blogging, because after all there’s a heck of a lot of fun to be had!

Ask geekmummy is a monthly feature where I attempt to answer your blogging questions. If you have any questions you’d like me to answer in future posts please leave them as a comment on this post or contact me via twitter – @geekmummy.

About Ruth Arnold

Ruth Arnold is geeky, tech-loving wife to one and mother of two. She has been blogging and podcasting in various forms since early 2005, and started her geekmummy blog in August 2010 whilst on maternity leave after having her son. Ruth blogs about living family life surrounded by technology, and particularly enjoys sharing her love of apps with her readers. Ruth enjoys using a variety of media on her blog - she produces not only written posts, but audio and video as well, and was delighted to be awarded the MAD Blog Award for Most Innovative MAD Blog in 2011.

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