Bloggers: How Do You Sharpen Your Axe?
Today we have a guest post from Damien Riley:
Time off from work, or whatever you do that resembles work, is crucial to writing as a full time blogger.
When stress reigns and you can’t get up from it, you’re stuck. It’s easy to say, “I work at home, I can take time off when I want to,” and it’s another thing entirely to DO IT.
Not giving yourself “mental health” or sick days will wind you up unhealthy. And if not unhealthy physically, then worse: UNINSPIRED. Have you ever read an uninspired blog? I have, it’s a bummer. I usually don’t return.
You may not have the financial ability to take a lot of time off . . . to you I say: “Find a way to recreate!”
| Meditate about your favorite places on your lunch hour, listen to headphones in your MP3 player, get outside of the realities that bring you down and stress you out.I like to read and color with my 3 year old. This is hard to start but once I get into her world I get lost and see the world (and whatever I’m working on) in a fresh new way. Go out into nature with a yellow pad and pencil and write what you see, feel, think. |
And don’t think for one minute that tech sites like this one don’t need these inspiration sparkers. Writing is writing and all writing comes from inspiration. Find a way to somehow separate yourself from the rest of the world, for a time. When you return, you’ll bring something back, inevitably something valuable.
Reading helps me cope with life. Time apart from the world and from people helps me summon something to write. How can I offer anything to my readers unless I step away sometimes?
I know of someone who is discouraged today, ready to give up on writing. Maybe that would be a good idea, temporarily. Walking away from our work can make our work better upon return.
I’ll close with this, thanks again to Keiron for having me as guest blogger today, remember “The Resting Jack:”
There were two lumberjacks in a contest to see who could chop down the most trees in 24 hours.? One cut non-stop while the other took frequent breaks to sip cocoa and read his leather book.? At the end of the contest, the non-stop jack had cut down 12 trees and the other 24. The beleaguered jack who never stopped axe-ing asked this question: “How, if you stopped so much, did you cut down more trees than me?” Then Jack retorted: “I stopped now and then to sharpen my axe.“
My question to all you full and part-time bloggers is this: “How do you sharpen you axe?”
About the guest blogger, Damien Riley: I’m a dad, teacher, author in Southern California. I keep an eye on pop culture, the news, and humor all around us. I have an MA in English with an emphasis in language, writing and rhetoric. I’m a published writer and have 2 blogs: a personal blog, where I share my daily impressions of life in a tumblelog format, and a “weekly greatest post” blog. I live with my three children and lovely wife in the High Desert of California.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks so much for having me as a guest blogger Keiron! Here’s a few ways I’ve sharpened my axe lately:
2 hours cleaning the house (wife even shampooed the carpets!)
30 minutes preparing lesson plans (This is really tough to get myself to do when I’m on break, but it pays off royally)
Put some new affiliate ads on my sidebar (www.cj.com)
Ignored my blog most of last evening and this morning.
I feel energized to head back to it now! Axe sharpened and all.
Hi Damien,
No probs at all! Sounds like you’ve started the new year with a bang, and proved how stepping away from your blog can be really productive!
[...] Have you ever read an uninspired blog? An excerpt from my guest blog post at Keiron’s Full Time Blogger blog. Thanks so much Keiron. This my first guest blog post of 2008! To my readers: Do me a favor [...]
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Hi Damien,
Thank goodness for people like you - I am on sick leave for at least a month with stress at work and am finding in week 3 of this time that having cleaned the house ad infinitum I now feel like like writing again - maybe one day I’ll feel like going back to work again?
Hi there Kate. I’m sorry about your illness. I truly hope the time off has helped you and that you work regular escape and time off into your schedule once you return. Thanks for the comment. You might want to check out my blog at Postcards from the Funny Farm as it is all about the psychology of inspiration. Best to you!
Damien
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