I've been obsessing about my release schedule recently.
I spent six months pre-writing my blog posts, sometimes having up to a month worth of posts written and scheduled. I had a rigid schedule of releasing a new post every Thursday. I like this schedule because it is a way to give the reader something on a relaxing Friday before starting their weekend.
I always had the intention that if I missed a Thursday, that would be fine. But I knew that wasn't true. I'm the kind of person that once I miss once, the drive will fade enough that I'll lose my momentum. Next thing I know, three months go by and nothing. I need the schedule to stay motivated; any will do.
When I picked up writing again, I considered a weekly release rate was burnt-out levels of output. I thought once a month would be better. That seems very doable. If I write a single post once a month, that would be easy. Sounds good!
Then I started thinking about the yearly article count. When releasing weekly, I would have 52 posts. That's a good number. When releasing monthly, that's only 12 posts. Sometimes I can write a dozen articles in a couple of weeks, so spreading the release of those out over a full year didn't fit.
My thoughts next went to a variable schedule. Something where if I have one or two posts queued up, I post monthly. If I have three to six posts queued up, I release every other week. And then if I have over six posts queued up, I would go back to weekly. That way, if I became inspired, I could release weekly and fade to monthly over time. It sounded genius.
Or not. I was getting my headache. This internal debate is how my brain works. I started spending more thought on HOW I would release my posts than WHAT would be in them (hence me taking an entire post on this topic). I'm going to try my hardest to let the obsession go and adhere to my original schedule: release on Thursday anytime I have something written AND to not fall off the wagon again for three months if I miss a week.
Forget the schedule. Just let the thoughts flow! Sometimes you just must let it go and see where things take you.
(Written 2019.10.19)
I spent six months pre-writing my blog posts, sometimes having up to a month worth of posts written and scheduled. I had a rigid schedule of releasing a new post every Thursday. I like this schedule because it is a way to give the reader something on a relaxing Friday before starting their weekend.
I always had the intention that if I missed a Thursday, that would be fine. But I knew that wasn't true. I'm the kind of person that once I miss once, the drive will fade enough that I'll lose my momentum. Next thing I know, three months go by and nothing. I need the schedule to stay motivated; any will do.
When I picked up writing again, I considered a weekly release rate was burnt-out levels of output. I thought once a month would be better. That seems very doable. If I write a single post once a month, that would be easy. Sounds good!
Then I started thinking about the yearly article count. When releasing weekly, I would have 52 posts. That's a good number. When releasing monthly, that's only 12 posts. Sometimes I can write a dozen articles in a couple of weeks, so spreading the release of those out over a full year didn't fit.
My thoughts next went to a variable schedule. Something where if I have one or two posts queued up, I post monthly. If I have three to six posts queued up, I release every other week. And then if I have over six posts queued up, I would go back to weekly. That way, if I became inspired, I could release weekly and fade to monthly over time. It sounded genius.
Or not. I was getting my headache. This internal debate is how my brain works. I started spending more thought on HOW I would release my posts than WHAT would be in them (hence me taking an entire post on this topic). I'm going to try my hardest to let the obsession go and adhere to my original schedule: release on Thursday anytime I have something written AND to not fall off the wagon again for three months if I miss a week.
Forget the schedule. Just let the thoughts flow! Sometimes you just must let it go and see where things take you.
(Written 2019.10.19)
