Monday, January 04, 2010

Back To Blogging

I didn't set out to intentionally take a three month break from blogging. But that's what happened. I didn't fall off the face of the planet. But I did realize that I had been going full blazes for quite some time. And to be honest, I got a little burned out. I kicked into overdrive across several of the places where I blog professionally last summer, as well as here.

Then, in early October, I attended four journalism-related conferences that had me blogging and tweeting non-stop. By mid-October, I decided to step back for a couple weeks. And that turned into a few months.

I stopped contributing to IdeaLab and even to SiliconBeat. And that was actually tough. Because a number of times I had something I really want to say, and forced myself not to say it.

In part, I've been trying to think about how to re-balance things in my life. Since I returned to work in mid-2007, I've frequently been working until 2 a.m. trying to juggle work at the Mercury News and outside projects and blogging. It hasn't been great for my health, even if I did enjoy it.

I'm back to blogging now. But I'm going to try to make other things a priority. Number one being my health. That's going to start with a self-enforced bed time of 11 a.m. each night. I've always known this, but getting enough sleep is essential to having the energy to work out and eat better.

I'm also trying to get back to reading. All my adult life, I've been a voracious reader of novels. The longer, the better. But back in 2007, I had a lot of research material to read, and I delved deep in to blogs, and I made a conscious decision to put books aside for awhile. That break turned into two years. I've been trying the past few months to read again, but fitting it in has been a struggle. I'm determined to do it, though. I believe I write better when I'm reading a lot of creative writing. So this is both a personal and professional issue.

So, these are my resolutions for 2010. Please hold me to them.

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