I saw a post, yesterday, from a content writer despairing at the fact she hadn’t posted anything on Linkedin in weeks.
She blamed Covid, imposter syndrome, and lack of creative stimulus.
If you look at my post from yesterday, you’ll know I concur with the second of those reasons.
But I want to consider the third of those reasons.
I try to write one post a week on here, maybe two if I’m on a roll.
You’ll see a big gap though, between 16th and 29th March.
I simply had nothing to say.
If I’m being honest, I don’t have much to say today – that’s why I’m writing a post about that very thing. It’s why yesterday’s post was short… and poor.
What I’m trying to say is that we’ve all got to stop beating ourselves up if we’ve nothing to say/write.
It’s okay not to write content for a while or ‘go missing’.
It’s better to write nothing than a load of crap you’re unhappy with and which does nothing for your reputation.
And it’s not surprising that you’ve got nothing to say. There’s nothing going in – not a new play, not an exhibition, not a gallery, not a night out, not an engaging conversation. Nothing.
There’s little point in reading the papers, as at least the first 10 pages are Covid related. I used to skim the Metro for ideas for posts – I can’t do that now.
All there is to talk/think about is going for a walk, what you’re going to eat, whether you’re going to get dressed properly today.
I’ve even found I’m running out of conversation with my closest family and friends. I just run out of steam halfway through a sentence. I dry up. My brain goes silent.
It’s almost impossible to create consistently good content from this. Sh*te in, sh*te out.
Nothing comes from nothing.
We all have standards. We’d all like to produce content that people want to read. We’d rather not post any old crap – like this – for the sake of posting.
So, be kind to yourself.
If you’ve got nothing to write or you need to go silent for a few days, or even weeks, so be it.
When things open back up and your mind opens back up, you’ll be full of ideas.
For now, hold tight and only post when you’ve got something to say.
