Blogger's block - Thought Leader

Immediately after I was approached to join Thought Leader, I was overwhelmed with an inner excitement that somehow left my fingers shaking at the same time. My immediate conclusion, before my profile was launched, was that I finally had a neutral place to lay down my thoughts and ideas indefinitely, where the information I squeezed from my mind (and Wikipedia) wouldn’t be bound to an entity — like a specific job, or a project that would ultimately come to an end. It was a great feeling until I logged in…

I have started and ended a few blogs in my life, and there have been different reasons for many of them coming to grinding halt. Take the Cuban Brother Blog (http://cubanbrother.blogspot.com) that stemmed from a dress-up party I attended with a close friend a year ago. We organised our very convincing Afros, black tuxedos and goggle-like glasses from a small store in Sunninghill — tada! The Cuban Brothers were born. Following several Johnny Walkers and some disco moves it was clear as daylight that a blog should be born to house the mounds of garbage we somehow found amusing, interesting, inventive and above all pointless.

The second blog was that of a more formal nature and focused on my core passion, cars. Dale Imerman’s Mod Blog (daleimerman.blogspot.com) was a place I could share information with other car fanatics. Simply put, the page was filled with daily features of dream cars and likely unobtainable motoring machinery. I loved posting to that blog and dubbed it the most comprehensive page in the world that exposes the latest aftermarket accessories and gadgets for performance, concept and customised cars.

The third blog was project based, and probably the most enjoyable for me. At my previous employer, I was handed the amazing opportunity of managing a project that would transform a brand-new Subaru into a modified beast for a Castrol competition (automakeover.blogspot.com). My employer argued with me constantly about “this blogging thing” I did. “A waste of time,” he would say; “pointless” and “unnecessary”.

I disagreed, of course! The blog was a space for me to document the process of the entire project and in turn had several spin-offs for us, the partners and the sponsors:

obviously a regular place the public could view the transformation;

an accessible location the media could obtain information and imagery for publicity;

a resource that sponsors could boast about and use for product case studies;

a site where the world was exposed to our local motoring talent; and

the site from which the final press releases would be compiled.

It created a legacy of the project that will exist until I opt to remove it someday. This blog, unlike the others, had a certain expiry date, and ended swiftly when the car was completed — just before I resigned from that job. Sometimes I wonder why it took me so long. Was it the project itself, or the project blog that kept me there?

You’re probably wondering what all this has to do with blogger’s block, right?

The overwhelming feeling I felt when asked to join Thought Leader combined with the current transition in my life left me with blogger’s block! I have been pondering about a topic to launch my page with for two days. Contemplating what I can write about that will be of interest to others daunted my mind.

Then, at 7am this morning after preparing a hot cup of coffee and staring at my screen for another 30 minutes, I realised I had the title for my post: “Blogger’s block”.

I decided I would type out what I was thinking and question why I was cursed with blogger’s block when such a great opportunity had come my way.

Then I realised something …

I am blogging again!