- How do you like having a blog? How has blogging changed the way you write, the way you think, or the way you think about writing?
- Where do you get your ideas for blog post topics? What inspires you to write?
- What have you learned from your struggles with writer's block? Why do you tend to get stuck? How do you tend to get unstuck?
I’ve really enjoyed having a blog this recent year. When I heard that it was required to make a blog, I wasn’t to happy about it. I had only ever heard blogs being about serious things like politics and government; so I thought that’s what we would have to write about, which didn’t exactly excite me. But once I heard that we could write about whatever we wish, I knew it was going to be pretty cool. Every teacher has always given us topics to write about, limits, and guidelines about the subject matter; I mean what else is new. It’s not that having ‘rules’ when writing is a bad thing, its just…boring. This is why I find blogging very interesting. I like the fact that we get to use our own personal creativity in coming up with new things to write about each week. How hard is it to write about anything you want? Blogging is something that I really like because it’s real. It’s exactly how you feel when your writing about a certain topic. There’s no wrong answer when you’re writing.
Blogging has changed the way I write in many ways. I think between the quick writes each day and the blogs each week, my writing has definitely matured. I have always had the same problem when writing something, and that’s taking something from my mind and putting it into words. Not only in writing, but in just speaking too. It has always frustrated me how our mind is something so cut off from everything else, you can think this whole scenario up and then can’t even explain any of it when someone asks. It’s like having a great idea, and no one to share it with. Like somewhere between my mind and my left hand, my ideas got lost. I think the constant practice writing each day has improved my writing into more of a flow of ideas, instead of them getting stuck and not being able to write at all. Last week, my mom found a quick write draft that we did in class and I had turned it into a blog. She was very impressed with the amount of detail and maturity that had gone into it; because I had never seen me write like that before, carry on a story without being distracted onto another topic. I was pretty happy about the compliment, especially from a perfectionist like my mother.
Most of the topics I write about are pretty random. Most of the time I don’t really think about them beforehand, I just sit down and start typing because I like ‘in the moment’ things. A lot of my blogs are just about my week has been, good and crappy. Then there is a couple stories that I wrote and some blogs are just thoughts on things. Mostly, if I'm in a certain mood, I’ll write about why I'm in the mood I'm in. Sometimes if we talked about something interesting in class that week I would add my own comments and thoughts on the subject at the end of one of my blogs. As I look through my blogs, I can see the progression in my writing. As time goes on, I start detailing things, making them longer, and having more to write about. I do want to continue blogging, but I want to write about a more variety of things. A lot of the time, I will see something on the TV or hear something interesting on the radio that catches my attention and I think that it would be a good topic to blog about, but I never follow it through and I think that is something that I can remember for future blogging topics.
I think anything can inspire you to write, because there’s no limit on what to write about. You can basically write about everything and anything. Some things that inspire my blogs would be books, topics in class, moods in general, etc. A big inspiration would be other people, surprisingly. Being able to look and comment on other classmate’s blogs is a very helpful idea. Sometime you will read someone’s blog and be like, I can add to that or I have a different opinion about this. Also, I think a lot of the discussions in class are the best for starter ideas when doing a blog because there are so many different people contributing their ideas. Then you go create your own blog on the topic and have more than enough ideas to keep you from not getting stuck.
I’ve always had problems with writers block. I think anyone who has ever written anything since the beginning of time has experienced writers block! What to write next? It’s the worst possible thing to get when you’re writing. I hate it because it ruins what you’re trying to write. Instead of having one full thought, it’s like little pieces coming out one by one. It slows you down and most of the time you just forget all together what you were trying to write in the first place. I tend to get stuck and have writers block when I get distracted by something or I'm trying to multi-task to many things at once. If I'm writing and just typing away, and someone says something that catches my attention or maybe even just a loud noise that takes my attention away from what I'm writing, I’ll try to go back to typing what I was writing and totally blank out. I won’t even remember what I was trying to say. There are distractions everywhere so this is always very frustrating when it happens.
I have found some personal ways to get around writers block though. Music is important in stopping my writer’s block. Music is not the distraction for me. I noticed if I'm listening to my Ipod while writing, I can get much more accomplished and written down. When I'm listening to music, it kind of takes me to a different place, separate from all the other distractions. It’s turns into a trance-like state, where I'm able to fully focus on simply writing and nothing else until the task is done. I’ve learned that writing blocks suck but they are normal and anyone can develop new ways to get around them, it’s definitely not impossible.
