Wednesday, March 28, 2018

Should I Close This Blog?

Ever tried to concentrate on something? Ever tried to concentrate on something, except that you can't, for the life of you, maintain that concentration? Every little sound, every thought, every person walking by and movement at the edges of your vision tearing your mind away from the task at hand? Ever had old associations bending your thoughts, funneling your mental processes down almost inescapable paths? That's me today, and it has been me quite a few times in the past as well. 

I had been thinking about resurrecting this old blog, because I've always been a believer in picking up where I leave off. I think it's a great way to maintain a sense of progress, even if you end up spending more time to refresh yourself than you would have spent just starting over. Continuing a project is, in my opinion, almost always better than starting over. Today, however, I'm on the fence. 

As I sat down to write a new entry today, to draw a line in the sand and start anew, I found it difficult to break away from the mental box I had constructed around this particular blog. I tend to divide my writing projects up, so each blog and journal I have develops a specific purpose, a dedicated style or goal. Perhaps it's the frustrating inability to concentrate that's exacerbating my issue, but I can't seem to just wash away my old mental designations for this blog.

This blog, No One Will Recall, was (and, for now, still is) my general writing blog; I started it back when my goal for writing was a career. My writing goals have since changed, my accounts have changed, and my entire view on writing has changed since then. Yet, for some reason, when I pop open a post for this blog the same old mental atmosphere returns. These days I'm not very critical of what I write, but before I balked at every other post idea, and often obsessed on writing itself, to the point that it was often hard to think about anything else. Some of that seems to remain, since I sat here for a good 30 minutes just staring at a blank page, wanting to write, but only able to think about being discontent over having nothing to write. Which led me to considering, should I close this blog?

Somehow, the thought of starting a new blog is inviting. New account, no old associations, less likely to have those old blog preconceptions crowding in on my post ideas. I'm tempted since, due to an account issue, I ended up creating a second Google account and have already moved most of my activities to the new account anyways. On the other hand, though, I will lose that progress, that history that I have here. I spent a lot of time here, trying to find a voice, obsessing over writing, struggling to make writing my 'thing'. My circumstances and perspective have changed though, so there is a sense of disconnect. Besides, and I say this without disappointment, it's not like this half-hearted blog ever really generated much interest or traffic.

So the question remains, soldier on and reshape this place, build upon its history and longevity? Or start anew, under a less ancient, more unified account, free from old associations? 

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