I stopped blogging for almost a year.
Not in protest. Not in a blaze of glory. Just… quietly. Like a party guest who slips out before midnight—no drama, no fuss—just the ache of knowing you’ve stayed too long.
When I started blogging back in 2009, Instagram was barely a thing, Pinterest hadn’t yet taught us how to moodboard our personalities, and people actually read blogs. Properly.
Those early days were freer—scrappier, maybe—but there was joy in the unpolished. Then blogging got serious. Suddenly, there were content calendars and brand partnerships, and “authenticity” became something you had to engineer. My posts stretched beyond 2,000, 3,000, sometimes 4,000 words. I loved writing them—but I also felt the creeping expectation to produce on a schedule. Weekly, if possible. (Reader, it was not possible.)
Blogging had become habit. Then obligation. Then, worst of all, a job I wasn’t being paid to do.
Meanwhile, the internet moved on. Instagram stories ate up blog content. Pinterest fragmented it. And Substack made everything sound like a personal manifesto. I wanted out—or at least, I wanted different.
Somewhere around 2020, when we were all baking banana bread and staring into the existential abyss, I started watching more longform video content: thoughtful vlogs, slow travel diaries, videos where people just made things, quietly.
It lit something up in me—possibly a buried film student, gasping for air. So I picked up my camera and started filming again. A new creative outlet, I told myself. Less pressure. More visual poetry.
Except, as it turns out, video takes ten times longer to produce than blog content.
And I, of course, being me, wanted everything to look cinematic. I wanted orchestral scores and natural light and moody pacing and captions that would make Sofia Coppola weep.
So again, I burnt out.
We spent Christmas in Guatemala. I filmed hours of footage—markets, volcanoes, glorious colour and noise. I had grand plans: publish the first vlog by January, set the tone for a new year of momentum.
It’s now Easter. Only one video is live. And I’m no longer measuring that as a failure. It took me a while to realise it, but I don’t want to create content on a conveyor belt. I want to make things that mean something to me—even if it takes longer, even if it’s out of sync with the algorithm’s demands.
I needed time to process the trip. As an introvert, I needed the kind of silence that lets things settle. The quiet of home after four weeks of motion. Not just the physical stillness, but the mental unclenching that comes from being back in your own space, with your own rituals, your own rhythm.
Paul Graham has a brilliant essay called ‘A Project of One’s Own,’ which I discovered via Anna Howard’s wonderful video essay, ‘How to fall down a curiosity rabbit hole & reconnect to your creativity.’
In it, he says:
‘You’re happy when things are going well, but often they aren’t… When I’m writing an essay most of the time I’m worried and puzzled… Will I be able to pin it down with words in the end?’
Yes. That. That is the creative process. The point isn’t to avoid the worry, but to keep writing anyway. To keep showing up for yourself. That’s what my blog has always been. Not a brand. A project of my own. And now, so is my YouTube channel. A space to explore ideas, reflect on experiences, and piece together meaning at my own pace.
There’s a pernicious myth in creative culture that consistency equals success, and that showing up daily is more important than showing up meaningfully. And sure, there’s truth in building momentum. But there’s also truth in stepping back, re-evaluating, and remembering why you’re making something in the first place.
Slow creation honours the natural rhythm of inspiration and introspection, as is what happens when you give yourself permission to create in seasons, not sprints. Sometimes that means pausing, sometimes that means publishing things months after you filmed them, and sometimes it means letting drafts sit half-finished while you wander off to read a book, stare at a magnolia tree or do absolutely nothing useful at all!
Some of you have been here since the beginning, and I know I’ve changed shapes more than once. For a while, I was embarrassed by that. I thought if I didn’t have a clear niche, I didn’t have value.
But I see it differently now. Changing has always been part of the point. Because I’m not a brand, I’m not an algorithm, I’m not a summary. I am a slow creator. And this—this is a space for the slow unfolding of things.
2 responses
Thank you! I (we) just moved, and I couldn’t do any “real” art for months! Now I am looking at it differently. The little watercolor sketches I could do have given me a different kind of joy, and as I start again with my ongoing project of elder portraits, I make time for the small things too.
It’s so important to listen to your natural rhythms and not force anything; whilst also resisting the urge to completely disconnect from your craft because it needs to be nurtured. I’ve been playing with watercolours a little this year too; such a nice way to enter ‘flow state’ and clear your mind of outside nosie.