You can be forgiven if you didn’t even realise I was away. At the time I announced I was cutting back on the blog for a month, I wasn’t sure I would be posting much at all.
The main reason was that over the past year I had gradually increased my posting schedule. All well and good, except that I was now spending a lot more time either blogging or looking for articles and videos to blog about. The bits I formerly planned were suffering and the bits that used to be spontaneous were becoming planned.
I decided to take a break, clear my head, and get clear in my own mind what I wanted the blog to be.
That process took less time that I had expected. The blog is still going to be centred around my hobby, especially painting miniatures and looking at fantasy art. Some written pieces will feature, and since those articles take longer, there will be fewer articles posted overall.
You can expect more art, more painting, and the occasional ‘other thing’ such as my series of articles on the Red Templars. I will maintain the week-end posting, but cut down the number of posts appearing overall. Expect 3-5 articles per week, rather than 5-8.
It only remains to say, thank-you for reading. Interacting with other bloggers is a real pleasure and is genuinely a huge motivator to continue going myself. Whether you comment, like, read or any combination, thanks for stopping by, and I hope you continue to do so. Cheers.
Gotta admit, if you hadn’t said anything earlier, I never would have noticed. Not sure if that’s a good or bad thing. At least you know your scheduled posting makes it seem like you’re here all the time ๐
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I think you’re right, and I very nearly didn’t post this at all. What I ended up doing was getting rid of the random mid-week posts, and cutting back on the week-end posts, but anyone looking at their Reader would still have seen my posts each week-end.
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I love scheduling. I might “write” spontaneously, but I don’t post spontaneously any more. Except on rare occasions ๐
I hope this little break helped you figure out just what works for you.
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Definitely, and I am a big fan of scheduling too!
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Your posts remained pretty consistent throughout, I have to say.
My own biggest issue with the blog thing is time, which is a non-negotiable zero-sum resource.
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Yes, the time thing is a killer, and you can’t spend the same hour twice. Doing more painting, or writing longer articles has been my replacement for the mid-week posts, and I’m happy with the exchange so far.
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I understand completely; Iโm a bit addicted to seeing my views roll in, and I often plan many of posts in advance. But keeping that energy up is exhausting sometimes. Iโve taken a step back too.
Glad to hear youโll still post though! I like seeing your content, itโs very consistent and always worth a read.
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I’m glad you like it! I enjoy the scheduling feature, but I was finding this that used to be scheduled (like painting updates) were being hurriedly done the night before, or even an hour before my usual posting time, as I was spending time elsewhere.
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Yeah when blogging becomes a job, especially an unpaid one, it becomes less fun. It’s better to enjoy writing your posts and post less frequently then to try and constantly post and hate it. And rushing a post is never fun.
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Balancing the time for a blog with real life is hard. I’d love to post more, but I’m not always finding/making the time to paint the figures I want to work on (still three skaven right in front of me). Taking a break was a good idea, even if it was short. None of us out here want you to feel so pressured or stressed by everything in life that you stop posting. If you post less, that’s fine! Take care of yourself!
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Thanks Tarmor!
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I was struggling with 3 posts a week and dropped down to 2, quite how you were managing up to 8 I’ll never know! ๐
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Sounds good to me, Dave, you’ll know the balance you want to achieve! ๐ I’m still following your “non-zero days” policy and even 20 to 30 minutes a day painting or preparing stuff keeps me ticking along!
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Yes, my painting days were starting to slip back to 3-4 days per week, something had to be done!
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Welcome back. My daily painting has slipped a bit, I am still doing something, but it is normally slicing or printing. I am trying to get started again.
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I love your daily updates!
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Many thanks
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Pingback: Well, Iโm back โ Scent of a Gamer | Ups Downs Family History
Great to see you back.
I’m finding I’m posting a lot less these days too but I try to catch up with other people’s posts every few days or so.
Cheers,
Pete.
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Cheers Pete, and I am the same – even if I’m not posting myself, I like to check out what everyone else is up to!
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Based on the photo above, I’m glad you had time to get your nails done during you sabbatical, Dave ๐ To be a bit more serious, I agree with others that I didn’t feel like you had been away. You did a great job of keeping the content going during the break. I hope the time off gave you perspective on what you enjoy writing about and what it might be time to jettison. I think that it is worth all of us thinking about to make sure we’re using our time wisely.
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Thatโs pretty much it; deciding where I wanted to spend my time in terms of blog writing
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