I’m sure a lot of my regular readers can already guess this but… I’ve been in a Writing Slump. Not just a writing slump, a life slump. I’ve been finding it hard to be motivated to do anything and I would like to change it now! I guess I just want to take this time to share where my head has been at lately for those who like to read about my Mental Health journey. Also to talk about where I have been, and my ideas for my blog. I need to revamp and reignite the energy I have inside so that I can get back to living my dream.
Ok so here is the truth, I’ve been feeling kind of depressed lately. Or more so, those intrusive thoughts have been much louder within my head during the past couple of weeks. I’ve been trying to write a separate article about this for the last week and I just can’t find the right words to explain how I feel. I have been really lucky with a lot of things in my life lately and I think those things help deflect a lot of my depression these days. However, with the oncoming changes recently, I haven’t been doing as much to keep the demons at bay and now they have taken over a little more than I would like. Don’t worry, I am ok, seriously. I think it is really important to acknowledge when things might not be feeling quite right, and that’s simply all I want to do right now.
I believe that another thing is that I got a little burnt out. Not on purpose, but I lost the point of my blog. I got too wrapped up in the numbers. In the fantasy that I could have a “popular travel blog” and needed to do all these things to make that happen immediately. While that is a dream, I am still a baby blogger. I always said to myself and told people that it is important to me that I keep my voice and remember why I started the blog. This has not changed. This blog was created to share my adventures with my friends and family, to become a creative outlet to write about my mental health experiences and to share what I’ve done to overcome a lot of my anxieties. My friend Miguel once asked me if I was getting too obsessed with my blog and all I could think was, “Of course not, this is just like another job and I just need to put in my time and work hard.” When I look back at it now, we were both right.
Blogging, vlogging, any type of creative process is much more difficult that one makes it seem. I love writing. Being able to openly talk about how I am feeling and having so many people relate is amazing. Also, travelling back through my old adventures while reminiscing about the small details of people that I’ve been grateful to meet and places that I’ve been able to see makes me so happy. Writing is not the problem and I’ve always been able to write a few posts at once, so I have them ready for the whole month (as I like to post only once a week). I think it was my mindset and the way I looked at the blog that changed and overwhelmed me. I went from 100 to 200 to almost 1000 views within three months. That’s not a lot for most people, but it honestly made me panic a little bit. I felt this pressure that I needed to do and create certain content so that I could keep up the exponential growth. I also felt a little boxed in by my timeline and this need to strictly write in order of my travels and not having the flexibility to deviate from that structure.
So with that being said, we are going to shake things up a little bit. I’m going to be blogging similarily to how I did at the very beginning, about anything I want. I want to still keep my timeline going, we are finally in Japan and you all know how much I absolutely adore Japan (if you don’t, you soon will). And then I really want to talk about my life right now. Not just the times I feel super emotional but about my life as an expat here in Bangkok. I love living here and it’s super exciting to me which in turn should help motivate me once again. That means there may be some new reorganization on my blog for those who just want to read about mental health stuff, those who want to keep following me on my journey here, and those who want to know about living in another Country where you don’t speak the language.
Talking about things like this saddens me a bit. The fact that I let it get to this point, where I just stopped blogging altogether even though I have two other posts ready to be shared. That I got super overwhelmed by something so trivial like blog numbers and blog growth. By the idea that I should have noticed the warning signs of the depression wave coming straight for me. However, at the end of the day (or in the wee hours of the morning) I found my way again.
The feature photo for this post is a photo I took in the new neighbourhood that I recently moved to. These types of buildings/apartments are staples in Thailand architecture, however, I was so captured by the vivid colours that the sections were painted. To me, this photo represents the new changes happening for me, growing forward and being able to find excitement again. Thanks for all the support and letting me share my feelings, we will see you next time!
–Candice
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