Blogging As Therapy – When Panic Strikes
Two days ago, just before my return to blogging, panic struck me. I'd taken two weeks "vacation" so that I could spend 16-20 hours a day working on re-launching and launching several websites, amalgamating blogs, creating new ones, and generally planning out my posts. But when it came time to stop drawing new web page designs and start writing, I couldn't do anything. I was frozen. It didn't matter that I'd sketched out nearly 200 blog entries scrawled into several sketchbooks.
I don't normally suffer from writer's block. In fact, it wasn't writer's block, as I already had content handwritten. But I couldn't get myself to sit down and transfer my notebooks full posts to my blog client (I use Zoundry's free Blog Writer almost exclusively). I was fearful that I would fall into the same trap as I had before my so-called vacation: that I would constantly chase my tail writing one entry, posting it, then moving on to the next one, with never a minute to relax.
But when I sat down and wrote this very entry, I realized that the simplest solution was to not post until I had several finished entries typed up and edited - in other words, ready to go. In magazine and newspaper parlance, this is known as "the kitty". I don't know the origins of the term, but it refers to a stockpile of articles that an editor can use if a feature story doesn't get completed or fact-checked on time.
I decided that I would not post again until I had at least 30 complete entries typed up, based on the notes I've scribbled down for the past two weeks. It's my only chance of staying sane from the self-imposed pressure of trying to be a professional blogger and internet publisher.
[NOTE: At posting time, I haven't finished typing and editing 30 complete posts, but I'm closer than when I wrote this entry earlier today.]
(c) Copyright 2005-present, Raj Kumar Dash, http://blogspinner.blogspot.com
I don't normally suffer from writer's block. In fact, it wasn't writer's block, as I already had content handwritten. But I couldn't get myself to sit down and transfer my notebooks full posts to my blog client (I use Zoundry's free Blog Writer almost exclusively). I was fearful that I would fall into the same trap as I had before my so-called vacation: that I would constantly chase my tail writing one entry, posting it, then moving on to the next one, with never a minute to relax.
But when I sat down and wrote this very entry, I realized that the simplest solution was to not post until I had several finished entries typed up and edited - in other words, ready to go. In magazine and newspaper parlance, this is known as "the kitty". I don't know the origins of the term, but it refers to a stockpile of articles that an editor can use if a feature story doesn't get completed or fact-checked on time.
I decided that I would not post again until I had at least 30 complete entries typed up, based on the notes I've scribbled down for the past two weeks. It's my only chance of staying sane from the self-imposed pressure of trying to be a professional blogger and internet publisher.
[NOTE: At posting time, I haven't finished typing and editing 30 complete posts, but I'm closer than when I wrote this entry earlier today.]
(c) Copyright 2005-present, Raj Kumar Dash, http://blogspinner.blogspot.com
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