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It’s inevitable, aspiring blogger or not-so aspiring. If you blog long enough, one day you may run out of words.

Not the most positive opening for this post, but hey, I’ve got to keep this thing real.

It’s happened to me twice over the years. I lost my focus and stopped blogging. I had so much to say at one point. Then at another, nothing. Nada.  

And I beat myself up pretty bad. I walked around feeling guilty and ashamed, thinking people were laughing at me because I failed. I imagined being the butt of jokes bloggers told and it was pretty nasty what they were saying. I was playing some serious mind games with myself, making up crazy stuff as we all do sometimes. It was pretty bad. 

Ashamed and embarrassed, I went totally ghost on my blog.

I didn’t email my subscribers for a year and a half. I wondered if they thought I’d fallen off the face of the earth.

I kept asking myself during this moment sans blogging, “Now, where was I?” I had the desire to blog, but I couldn’t find words or my place. I even posted a few blogs out of guilt, but they were lacking the passion and insight I poured into my earlier work.

The crazy thing was, I thought I ran out of words, but I hadn’t. Just because I wasn’t writing for GoneGirlGo, I wrote something. I wrote movie and event reviews for other blogs. I helped aspiring bloggers find their voice. I shared my morning pages on Instagram. I started writing journal prompts on notecards every chance I got. And I journaled a lot, most of which wasn’t anything I’d want anyone to read, but that wasn’t the point.

I was stretching my writing muscles.

I was finding my way through.

I was letting go.

I was healing.

I was creating space in my world for something new.

And just like that, I found my way back to GoneGirlGo with a renewed commitment. I guess I needed the time away to figure things out. Whatever it was, it felt good to be in my element once again.

If you run out of words and stop blogging, write something.

And for you non-bloggers, here’s the same advice said in a different way. If you lose the passion to do something you once loved, do something.

(Or take a break dammit because you might need one.) 

I understood my writing block wasn’t a really a block like Anne Lamonte said in my favorite book about writing, Bird by Bird.

Life emptied me and I needed time to fill up. But while I was filling up, I wrote something, even if it wasn’t what I thought I was supposed to be writing.

Once I realized this, all I could do is smile at myself because I was free and full again.

How about you? When you stopped doing something you loved, what was your response? Did you beat yourself up or did you find your way through? Write a reflection in your journal, tell me in the comments or in an email to zoe@gonegirlgo.com