A Change Of Scenery // A Shift In Mindset

The last month I’ve really hated blogging and social media.

There is so much negativity surrounding the online would in the press, social media seems to be a place for bloggers to have arguments with each other and every man and his dog has an opinion on what you are doing and why it isn’t good enough.

It’s never easy putting parts of your life online, but recently, I just haven’t had the passion for blogging that I once did. I know a few people have felt the same way in past weeks with a lack of wanting to get anything written and uploaded and maybe it’s the time of year, maybe people’s real lives have got in the way, but it’s interesting to know that I’m not the only one that’s been feeling like this.

I think for me personally, I haven’t felt the same buzz about blogging like I had last year. Posting seems to be more of a chore than anything else, and I had so many drafts in my folder that I never get around to finishing. Also, working from home means that I am constantly in my office, and the last thing I want to do after a 9-hour day is sit there and write some more.

It’s difficult when you day-job is creating content, even if it’s about something completely unrelated with your blog, because, for me, I feel as though that has zapped all of my energy and concentration before I can even think about writing something for myself. And if I’m honest, I don’t want to spend time of my weekend doing something I’m not fully passionate about.

In 2019, I made a conscious effort to go away less, explore more of the UK and make memories in my hometown; but when your passion is to write about travel, it can be quite deliberating when that’s the last thing you want to do, and even more so when you can’t put your finger on why this has happened.

Planning a wedding has really taken over my life too, and although I absolutely LOVE writing about the big day and hoping that my posts will help other brides out there, it can be tough to juggle that with a full-time job and a passion for blogging – so the latter took a back seat.

It even got the point where I wasn’t using my bullet journal because I had no want to write and be organised. I wanted to live in the moment, not worry about social media or blogging, and take each day as it came. I didn’t want to spend my time updating my media pack, pitching to brands and worrying about unanswered emails – I wanted to be a regular 28-year old.

And if I’m honest, it’s been quite refreshing to have a different perspective for the past few weeks.

I wrote this post about why I don’t set myself resolutions or goals at the start of the year, and this mindset has been completely the reason why – I can only imagine that I would feel awful if I had a content calendar to stick to, or certain targets to hit when I’m already on the edge of being burnt out anyway.

But then something interesting happened… I went to New York and felt this whole new energy of being away and in a different environment.

I started to get excited about writing again, sharing my thoughts and having an opinion online: I wanted to write after a long days of walking around, and all I could think about was the blog posts I could share about my experiences. I had found the new lease of life that I was looking for, and all it took was a change of scenery.

It’s the age old saying that your mindset changes when your environment does, and for the most part, I do agree: I feel more inspired when I’m around the vibe of other creatives, but I also relish time spend by myself, in a world of my own thoughts.

Travel has always been such a huge part of my life, especially in recent years, but it got to the point last year where I was doing it so much, I wasn’t really ‘living my best life’ so to speak, even though I was at the same time. The going away part, and sharing it on Instagram was enjoyable, but when it came round to sharing my experiences on my blog, I didn’t have the energy to relive the whole thing, especially if I’d left it to weeks afterwards to write the post.

Blogging isn’t my full-time job, it’s a hobby, and I never want it to be my sole purpose or source of income. To me, there really isn’t anything wrong with not sticking to set days to post, a set number of Instagrams a week or a YouTube calendar – my real life is structed enough without having my side hustle having to be too, and the beauty of sharing parts of your life online is that it’s ‘real’ and messy and unprecedented and you never know what’s coming next… so isn’t that the way our blogs should be too?

I know loads of people who are set in their ways with blogging and regularly uploading, and I completely get it – I was the same up to a few months ago, but I put insane amounts of pressure on myself, and although I loved it at the time, at the moment there just isn’t enough space in my life to keep it up. Blogging when you have a full-time job is hard work, and anyone who does it knows how difficult it can be from time to time.

Maybe one day I’ll fall back into the swing of things with set days to upload, pre-writing content, and having a whole section of my life dedicated to my little online space; and I’m excited about the new buzz of energy I’ve got from being away, but for now I just want to ride this wave and hope that it sticks around for longer.