Totally and completely mentally blocked, that’s how I feel right now.

Hello again, friends. You might have noticed I’ve been away for a while. Sorry about that - but I really appreciate you sticking it out with me. Which I’m assuming you have if you’re reading this now. I promise I won’t be MIA forever and I’m not at a loss for words, but rather just feeling lost on how to say them. I did, excitingly, post a new update all about my visit to Jacksonville, Florida recently, which is worth a view and can be found here.

I like to be honest with you all and lately I’ve been feeling down and out, both with my blog and with my life outside of it. I’d like to blame the weather or the universe, but the truth is, I really don’t know what’s been draining me of so much of creativity and mental space. I could go on a ten-hour rant about how busy, stressful, confusing, and complicated getting old is. I’ve said it so many times before, but adulting friggen sucks. In many ways, I feel like all I have the time and energy to do these days is get up, go to work, and go back to bed. And please, before too many of you jump on the work-life-balance bandwagon, just know that I freaking love my job, so this is in no way a reflection of my work. It’s simply a reflection of me.

When it comes to this blog, my intention was always to just have a place that was ALL MINE to espresso myself. I love having a place to be opinionated and creative and that’s why I’ve been writing in journals and on pages like these for as long as I can remember. Despite the fact that I’ve been as busy and exhausted as I’ve been, my biggest issue goes deeper than that. While I have enough stories and topics to keep me going for months and months to come, I feel lost as to how to frame them and whether or not anyone would even want to read them once I’m done.

This content creation conundrum is one that most creators go through at some point or another throughout their career, I’d imagine. It’s a mid-life crisis of sorts. In my case, my blogger crisis is putting a complete block on my story-telling abilities. Every time I sit down to write, I get a few sentences in, hate them, scrap it, and switch over to Netflix. I just feel unmotivated and uninspired. If anyone has any advice on how to get my mojo back, suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

I love telling stories and always have. My parents recount times as a child when I would stand on chairs in the middle of restaurants and share made-up tales with the entire room. Feeling heard and listened to is a great feeling, which is one of the main reasons I started writing, way back in 2014. I also just love keeping the people around me updated on all the things they always ask me about. I feel like I'm much better at writing than I've ever been at speaking; so here I am. You know?

That said, what I'm figuring out is that the question of "would anyone want to read this" is exactly my problem. When I first started doing this, I was writing pretty solely for me. People loved what I put out into the world because there was love and passion behind my words. I was writing to document my life - it was an online diary, in a way. I told stories to preserve their memories so that even as I got older, I'd never forget how I felt going abroad or watching planes fly, or whatever. So maybe that's where I'm going wrong now. I'm writing for the wrong reasons - or rather, the wrong person(s).

I adore having readers from all over the world who read and I love what I do. But this blog has always been, and should always be primarily for me. When I frame my writing for me, it's so much more well-received by you because my voice and passion come through. It's almost like I get virtual stage fright. I have to pretend I'm the only person who is ever going to see it to fully get to be myself, or I’ll choke.

Maybe that sounds strange to many of you, and I'm so sorry if my rambling is annoying or not what you came here for, but tbh that’s kinda the point. I think in order for me to continue to be able to write for everyone else, I have to start writing for myself again. It sounds backwards, but if you’re a content creator out there, maybe you understand. If so, let me know in the comments below - I’d love to know that I’m not totally alone on this one.

In the end, I love my blog and I love my audience, but first and foremost I love to write and that’s what I want to focus on going forward: good-quality stories that make me proud to publish and excited to read back. I’m one girl who has never been short of things to say, and starting now, hopefully, I can say them with even more conviction than ever before.

It’s time I release my creative energy from the constrains of wanting to please others with my words. I’m done worrying so much about who’s reading and I’m going to remember instead who’s writing.

“And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.”

— Sylvia Plath