Ugh, writer's block...
The past few weeks have been pretty dismal for my writing muse. The picture above is a screenshot of my current dashboard which, if you’ll notice, is full of posts marked as DRAFT. These are all posts that I’ve started and just couldn’t find the heart to finish. On just the front page, I’ve got a whopping 14 unfinished posts, all written within the last week. There’s even more piling up on the pages behind.
As you can see from the titles, I’ve got (what looks to be) some interesting (I guess?) posts lined up, if I ever end up finishing them. It has been very hard for me to concentrate lately and I’m not sure why. Thoughts flit from here to there and I am finding it hard to just get any coherent thought to publish. When I do get something written, it often sounds just plain wrong and not nearly half as interested as it sounded in my head.
I know that I am self sabotaging and in the end, it hurts my blog. By extension, I also hurt myself since this blog has always been intended to be a jumping point to something more. And as I scramble to find more freelance work, I am realizing that one of the things that is hurting me is that I’ve yet to really understand what that “something more” is. Some times, I am afraid that I am sharing too much of myself and my family on this blog and others, I am afraid I am not sharing enough. And all the while, what do I want to achieve with this blog? Do I want to use it as a slice of life? Do I want to use it to help others?
I need to figure it out. 
It seems like the blogging (for revenue) world is all about niche, niche, niche. Find that niche, become the star of it! Drive traffic to your site! Comment! Round up controversy! Start discussions!! Get those hits!!!! IMPRESSIONS IMPRESSIONS IMPRESSIONS!!
And yes, all those exclamation points are necessary because that’s what the world of blogging for revenue feels like. And it sucks.
One of the biggest problems that I am having is that I’ve always used my blogs as a journal of my daily ins and outs. Sometimes, what I do during the day is of interest to people and other days, well, as the book says, No one cares what you had for lunch. (Well, unless you’re a food blogger like The Food Pornographer or Mmm-Yoso in which case everyone is obsessed with what you had for lunch (myself included).)
Personally, I’ve come to see blogging as a way of using my verbal/photographic muscle so they don’t atrophy while I’m (quite happily) wiping the nth snotty nose and changing yet another diaper or engaging in a marathon nursing session for the 4th year in a row. I also see as a way of connecting with friends and family en masse. So I’ve become less concerned with perfect posts and tailoring the blog and more concerned about having content published–any content…so that I using the time to process my day (though the sharing) instead of running wildly from one to the next without thought. But then again, I dont’ take advertising and I’m not that concerned about readership among strangers.
I’d have to agree that the most profitable blogs are very niche, indeed.