I have a confession to make…..
I’ve been slacking. I’ve been slacking for several years now.
When I first began traveling back in March 2007, this website was literally a weblog (aka a blog). I’d write almost daily about whatever was on my mind. Things I experiences, stories I had to share, and thoughts about the places I visited.
Over time I focused more on photography and I started posting more photos and writing less. For over eight years I posted a photo every day on my website. Once a photo is edited and uploaded, they are pretty easy to work with. You can post an image in just a few minutes and it doesn’t require much thought.
Posting a photo every day also immensely helped me as a photographer. Making my work public forced me to get better, which is exactly what happened.
The downside is that it made my lazy as a writer. My site morphed from a travelogue to a photography site. When I did write, I tried to make everything article which could be something I could submit for awards. The problem is, doing that takes a lot of time. I would have to wait for all my photos to get processed and uploaded, which meant that I’d often have to wait months before I could write anything.
Two years ago I ceased doing my daily photos. I figured it had achieved what I wanted it to, and by that point, it was just difficult to keep with posting a photo every day, especially when I was traveling.
The problem was, I didn’t replace the photos with anything else. I kept to my super high standards which lead to not posting very much at all.
I started posting long rants on Facebook about a number of things. I posted it there because I didn’t think it was worthy enough to put on the blog. After one lengthy rant, someone sarcastically commented, “you should start a blog”. Sadly, they had a point. This is exactly the sort of thing I should have been putting on my blog.
A blog doesn’t have to be a travel magazine. It doesn’t have to be an endless stream of “Top 10 Things to do in Paris” articles.
It eventually dawned on me that I needed to go back to basics. I needed to go back to blogging. While I can still do the occasional long-form piece, I needed to get back into the habit of posting my thoughts and observations on a regular basis. I need to get back into the habit of writing.
I’m a firm believer that writing is exactly that: a habit. It is a habit that I’ve fallen out of.
Therefore, I’ve set the goal of posting every day during the month of March. Some of the posts will be longer and more formal, some will be shorter and more informal.
I’m writing this just because it is an excellent excuse to write a post today, and it presents what I’m doing publically. I’m hoping all of you will help keep me on my toes this month.