How To Find Your Blogging Voice?

All the 'how to blog better' advice always goes on about how you should blog about your passion. If you do, it'll come through in your posts, instantly making you more interesting and more likely to make your fortune from the comfort of your living room.

I agree that you should blog about something you're passionate about - why would you want to regularly sit down and write about something you find dull? Surely even the motive of finding your internet business cash cow wouldn't really be motivation enough to buckle down to it, when it comes to the slow drip feed that building up a blog takes. Post by post, day by day, one new reader at a time...

But writing passionately isn't an automatic route to great content. Finding your passion is different from finding your voice. I've been doing this Traildreamer blog for over a year now. It stems from various interests and passions, it has tracked aspects of my journey. I know I don't do much of what you're 'supposed to' if you want to increase traffic and make money, but I do feel I have found my 'voice' for this blog and I have a small number of readers who check in regularly. When I have something I want to say, it flows very naturally and I enjoy it. I hope that comes through in the reading of it. I'll never be a pro, but I get a lot of satisfaction out of this blog.

I've recently started a new blog, one that links much more closely to my professional interests, and I hope may lead to my own business in some way in the future. I'm not ready to add a link here to it, because I really haven't found my voice over there yet. Each post is clunky and awkward. The content is scatty. The focus switches. I'm trying to write about professional interests that get me really worked up, excited and enthused on a daily basis in my 'real life', but finding a way to talk about it coherently and consistently in a blog is proving unexpectedly tricky. This is stuff I do all day, but it's not stuff I've ever written about or even talked about much.

I've noticed this clumsiness in other blogs I've followed, as they switched from being personal journeys or philophy of life musings to something more strategic. I'll not name them, that would be indiscrete, but I'm guessing it's something that happens quite often. I'd love to know what others think about this. Have you seen the process in blogs you've followed? Have you been through that transition yourself and can offer some advice?

I don't yet know how to find your blogging voice. But I need a new one, and I'm going to be working on finding it. I'll let you know how I get on.

Image from Beverly & Pack

Travelling Gets Into Your Blood

There's been a rush of Hobopoet posts in the past 24 hours (see here), after months of barely anything. For many years Hobopoet was my favourite blog, before he switched from blogspot to his own domain and then promptly seemed to lose the thread of his hobopoet journey.

A new post from AJ usually gives me a wee boost, redirecting my mind back to the priorities of freedom and voluntary simplicity again. In recent months I've strayed from these priorities, because I've reached what might be described as a 'happy medium.' I've landed a great job doing something I love. And I'm living somewhere I love too - I've left the cities behind, and have the space and solitude of the Scottish Highlands to enjoy every day. A happy medium is a great place to be. Maybe the happy medium is the goal I've been chasing, the word 'medium' irrelevant? Is that word 'happy' the true bottom line? I can't complain, and don't much anymore... Except...

It can't last. My contract is for three years, and then... what? Funding dries up, and we're all back out on the street looking for jobs again. It's silly to worry about what I'll do in three years time, and I don't worry about it exactly. I feel more confident than ever before in my life. But I do feel in my bones that I couldn't bear to go back to working out of an office, with a boss who micromanages, and the autonomy and creativity I enjoy in this job firmly squashed. I couldn't stand to submit again to the senseless bureaucracy and hierarchical systems that dominate most jobs in the sector I work in. I'd hate to shelve all the projects that I can pursue in this job, projects that make a difference to my clients and excite me to pieces, and just go back to doing what I'm told and no more.

And, although I've hung up my travelling shoes and stashed my backpack at the back of a cupboard, I'd be lying if I claimed that I don't crave periods of simple nomadic wandering. I've booked a week down in Edinburgh for a training course in October, and I am so fizzy with anticipation at the thought of living out of one bag again, possessions to the minimum, drifting through hostels, quiet times spent writing and observing, learning some pretty amazing stuff at the training course for five days, and soaking in the experience of being adrift again. Travelling gets into your blood. While I may never take off for a year or more at a time again, I can't say I could settle for just two weeks a year either.

The upshot is, I've a strong desire to claim control and live my life doing what I love in a sustainable way, not to fit in with what needs to be, as dictated by a boss or a mortgage or a funding provider's short-term aims. Some people are always driven to do more, and some people aren't great at submitting to the way it is. I may be one of them.

Image by Irargerich

Once You've Got It, Would You Ever Give It Up? Working From Home

Poor Traildreamer is sorely neglected these days. The two things that drove it in the beginning were my dual passions of running and travelling.  Those two threads led to all sorts of rants and research into work culture, freedom and how to pursue your dreams. No wonder the Traildreamer blog has faltered since then - I've hung up my travelling shoes for the time being while I commit to staying in one place for a bit, probably about 3 years. I've hung up my running shoes due to injury. And many days I don't even make it into a pair of work shoes.

I work from home, often in pyjamas and slippers till lunchtime. I'm pretty passionate about my job, and have an excellent manager who's clearly sussed out that she gets the best work out of me by leaving me to it apart from a once monthly meeting and the odd email.

I'm still assimilating the novelty of this new work set-up. I often marvel at it, and speaking to colleagues in other areas of the Highlands who've been doing the same thing, they all say the same thing...

"How're we ever going to return to a normal work arrangement?" It's true. We were all selected for these jobs based on certain qualities and values, and this job has allowed those qualities to flourish. I have a job description, I have a laptop and a mileage reimbursement rate, and I have outcomes I have to achieve. But how I go about achieving those outcomes is entirely up to me. Help and advice is there for when I want to ask for it, but generally I'm trusted to get on with it entirely on my own. I love that.

Taking on that kind of working arrangement needs high levels of autonomy, integrity, discipline and creativity. And after working like that for several years, how would you go back to an office environment, hierarchies, knowing your place, being closely monitored and controlled, enforced dress codes, having to get approval for every decision or action, being told what to do...?

I think the answer to that is, you wouldn't.  Not if you could bloody well help it.  Would you?

Image by ansik

Running Gems: Barefoot Under Cover of Darkness

Under cover of darkness, I go out barefoot and walk around the block, just to see. Only it isn't about seeing, it's about feeling! The pavements feel smooth, cold, wet. Leaves are falling from the trees, and are a light, barely-present tickle against my feet. Some kind of seed pod is scattered all over the ground, and as I step on them, I'm surprised to find that they 'give' under my weight. It's a pleasant sensation. I gingerly hobble over the stones and grit where the road surface is broken, and bits stick painfully to my soles. I notice that I'm padding along on the ball of my foot more than I usually do when out I'm walking.  Back at the front door to my block of flats, I unlock and walk in. I wipe my feet, and the mat feels course, but warm after the leeching cold of the concrete outside. I notice I've left wet footprints on the tiled communal porch, and I imagine someone else in the block getting up early for work, and seeing these prints on their way out.

Photo by greencolander

A Blog Worth Checking Out

This is the most amazing post yet, from a truly amazing blog - check it out:

http://ryanrunseurope.blogspot.com/2009/07/days-47-48.html

This guy is an inspiration.

Short Trails & The Injured Runner

It used to be that anything less than 3 miles wasn’t worth getting out of bed for. 

What’d be the point of going out for such a short distance?  But currently 3 miles is about 1½ miles too far to walk, and I can forget about running it altogether. No can do. The physio and the podiatrist have both drummed it into me that over-doing it will do me no favours, so for now, just don’t run at all. I can cycle and swim as much as I like, which is a mercy, but neither are as satisfying as a fast 4 mile run before breakfast, or a full day out walking in the hills. Of course, I’ve pushed my luck, and either walked too far or tried out a bit of a run despite the advice of the professionals. But I’ve come to regret it, as my recovery has taken a knock-back each time.

Now that a whole day on the mountains is out of the question, what can I do? Where can I go that’ll still give me those much-needed shots of wilderness, exploration, and physical challenge?

I haven’t found a satisfying answer to those questions. But I do find myself looking at local ‘short walks’ guides with new-found interest. I used to find them disappointing, their definition of short being considerably shorter than anything I'd consider worth the bother of turning up for. And they don’t meet my demands of wilderness, exploration and physical challenge. But they do meet the closely related criteria of the outdoors, nature, discovery and some level of physical activity. I now appreciate these 20 minute out-and-back, signposted strolls from the car park, that take me over smooth landscaped trails and don’t require even the slightest scramble.

And I’ve gained a fresh insight into the frustrations of being restricted by my body from accessing and enjoying some of the greatest delights in this world, the places that enrich my life and replenish my soul. 

As someone who's spent the last 5 years or so working in disability services, there's nothing like an injection of first-hand personal experience to refresh my therapeutic practice.  I'm finding it all as frustrating as ever in terms of my personal fitness.  But in terms of my understanding of the importance of the natural world to my health and wellbeing, and the barriers that stop some people enjoying those same opportunities that I value so highly, I guess I'm learning something useful.

Image by cogdogblog

Gen Y Blogs: Are They Special?

I read a lot of these Gen Y blogs, especially if they have a strong entrepreneurial/start-up thread. This is even though I suspect I’m outside the Gen Y age-bracket, and despite the fact that, for the time being at least, I’ve shelved the idea of starting my own business. So why do I keep coming back to them? Why are they the ones that clutter my Google Reader, rather than the hiking/running blogs that I probably have more in common with?

I think it’s to do with the notion of striving for the life you want to live.

These Gen Y bloggers, they’re all about their search for their path in life, their striving to stay true to their dreams and passions, and they’re putting their dilemmas and initiatives out there along the way, for others to follow, and comment on, and discuss. It seems from some of these blogs that they think it’s their generation that defines them in this search - I say that it’s not. That quest is not specific to people born between year X and year Y (as stipulated in the Wikipedia definition of Gen Y). What is different for their generation is that they’ve come of age with the internet, and see their lives through that lens. Every generation of 20-somethings has a significant number of souls who struggle to find their paths and wish for something different and better that the norms offered by conventional society. The majority ‘grow out of it,’ a minority don’t and become the hippies, radicals, artists, drop-outs, nomads, and independent thinkers of their generation. What’s different, and appealing, about the current crop of Gen Y blogs is that this process is out there, globally, for all to see in the blogosphere. Support and reinforcement flows from blog to blog. And it’s also interesting that the Gen Y bloggers don’t aspire to be artists or drop-outs, but high achieving internet-based entrepreneurs... That, I think, is what’s different.

A few examples of these Gen Y blogs? Here's a good three to have a look at:

Jun Loayza
Matt Cheuvront
Luke Snedden

(Warning: Once you have a look at those few, you could end up wandering forever, lost in a world of links from Gen Y blogger to Gen Y blogger, commenting and crediting and name-checking each others stuff...).

Image by jetheriot

Phase 2

I put a couple hours into the Traildreamer blogbook this morning.

I think I have a new direction for the project. Which is exciting. I’m calling it Traildreamer Phase 2, because the themes of the original block of the blog don’t seem so relevant anymore. That fight is over, a new one is beginning.

I’m not all het up about work culture and wage-slavery anymore, because I’ve stepped out of that culture. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still working a full-time job, and I’m not working for myself... But it almost feels like it. I have such a level of freedom, autonomy and creativity in my new job, and it gels so well with my values, that it scarcely feels like work. It feels more like a passion, and I’m lucky enough to get paid to pursue it!

Traildreamer helped me get this magical job. Not directly, but indirectly. Part of what was needed for the post was an unconventional attitude, and over the months of blogging, that’s exactly what I was developing. All that reading and writing on work culture, wage slavery, manic society, freedom, following your bliss... it led me to this point, where an astute interviewer picked-up on the views simmering away underneath my surface, and instead of seeing them as a reason to dismiss me, saw them as the reason to hire me! ‘We wanted someone comfortable with a little bit of anarchy,’ she tells me 3 months after I started, ‘someone who is able to see that most things probably need to be done differently, and won’t be too shy to try some off-the-wall initiatives.’ Ha! The main thing I thought was my terrible guilty secret in my old job, is my key strength in my new one.

So, this new direction. It brings me right back to where I started, in many ways. Traildreaming. This blog isn’t about my work, though there are various points where work is relevant, and it’ll probably stay that way. Traildreamer started because I’d spent many years travelling round various parts of the world, and going running pretty much everyday. My life revolved around running, and finding damn good trails to run out on, no matter what town or village I’d washed into the day before.

Finding trails for running, walking, and cycling. Trailfinding ways through life that are thrilling and satisfying and rewarding. That’s what this blog is about, and that’s the direction I’ll be heading out on in future posts. It’s good to regroup, its good to keep going, and it'll be interesting to see where I end up.

Running Gems: Trail Run in the Highlands

It's all just too glorious. My ankle is actually still out of action (still!!!!), but I'm still making sure I get out there in some form or another. This track goes for miles. Life doesn't get any better.

Photo by Me

Back Again

I'm back. Honestly, I am.

For those of you out there who've been following me for a while, and have kept checking in from time to time on the off-chance that I might have posted something, all I can say is sorry for being otherwise occupied for the past couple months. But my life is settling down again, and there is now enough brain-space left in my head at the end of each day to be able to get back to some blogging.

It's good to be back. And it's good to be where I'm at.

Life has changed massively since I left my sensible job and my city flat back at the end of March - and I'm so glad I made the leap. That leap has liberated me from so much of the bullshit of living and working based on other people's stupid expectations and conventions. Now I'm in a position to push forward with amazing things. Here we go folks.

Amazing image by D. Sharon Pruitt