Wilt

I'm all blogged out... This is the first post for a month, when I've been averaging two a week all year. I just suddenly didn't have anything to say, and no motivation to even think about it.

I'm suffering from a bad attack of the blogging blues. They don't appear out of nowhere of course. They creep up on you insidiously over a period of time. In my case they were triggered by the recent problems at Blotanical (triggered you understand, not caused.) My already somewhat pathetic stats plunged, and I missed a goal I'd set myself by a mile. And at a certain point it didn't seem worth it any more ...

I ploughed on. But I wasn't just blogged out, I was balconied out too. Since the beginning of the autumn I've barely set foot out there. Whole containers got attacked by downy mildew and I just sat and watched. Plants wilted from lack of water and I just thought I'll do it tomorrow. Temperatures plunged and I just left plants out and uncovered. Whaat ??! This isn't like me. These are my babies ...

But if I wasn't working on the balcony, then there was nothing to write about it. My posts were getting more and more general. Where was the blog going? What was I trying to achieve?

The underlying cause was probably a nasty dose of overwork - when you're already spending twelve hours a day writing at the computer, and still missing deadlines, an hour spent blogging neither seems justified nor particularly appealing.

But it doesn't seem to be going away, so where do I go from here? I've been seriously thinking of closing down the blog all together. And I see I'm not the only one. Several blogs I follow have closed, or at least changed direction recently. Does there come a time when you've just been there, done that and it's time to move on? I've been blogging for over two years now,and the blogosphere has changed radically in that period. At the beginning it was cosy. Now it sometimes feels like a jungle ...

In the last couple of days one or two nice things have happened which have made me rethink. Should I try changing direction too? Go for more of a how-to approach and monetarise the blog? Broaden out and add a second topic? Redo the template and the layout ? Would that give me the impetus to start up again?

To those of you who do follow the Balcony Garden, whether regularly or occasionally, thank you. Without your comments I'd have stopped long ago. And I'd love some advice. Have you ever had the blogging blues? How did you get through it? What would you do with the Balcony Garden if you were me? How could I improve it, and make it more fun - both for me and for you ?