Overcoming a writer’s block – The Travelling Squid on hiatus 

It’s 10.30pm on a weekday evening. Ed Sheeran is playing in the background on Spotify. I stare blankly at my WordPress editor. I know my head should be filled with thoughts of the Jerónimos Monastery in Belem which I’m suppose to write about, but for some reason, my thoughts are lost elsewhere..

I have a sip of wine, hoping that the magical juice, the elixir of life could give me the inspiration to write. Instead, the cool December breeze flows in to my room, and The Pillow beckons me to join it on the bed.

My fingers leave the keyboard, as I gentle drift towards the bed. Soon I’m all cuddled up, with Eeyore under one arm, and The Pillow in another. The magical juice slowly takes effect, leaving a slight smile on my face…

“Blog.. blogg… blogggg.. oh crap I need to finish a blogpost tonight!” I sit upright at that thought. Looking around me. All is calm. The lights on my laptop are still on, and so is my half-empty glass of magical juice.

I look back at my bed. It looks inviting. Then I think of all the struggles of maintaining a 3 post – week blog with a day job.. I decided I have to go on.

It’s 10.45pm and I flip open the laptop again. The title says “Photo Story: Visiting the Jerónimos Monastery in Belem”, but apart from that, I’ve gotten nowhere. I take a look at the pictures which I have taken.

They are nice, but are of statues, figurines of angels and wise men… and suddenly, I’m just at lost of how to describe them.

I’ve used the word ‘nice’ countless of times, and it’s just really tiring to continue saying that.. oh this castle is “really cool” and the “architecture is great”. You know. For that one moment, I felt really tired. I wasn’t even halfway through my tales of the recent Europe trip, and yet it does seem so difficult, trying to use adjectives to describe these pictures and places.

As the magical juice would allow it, I click a series of fruitless clicks on the ‘saved drafts’ button, resigned myself to fate and flipped down the lid of my laptop. That’s the end as I prepared for bed.

That has been my life for the past couple of weeks. I’ve made not much headway in blogpost writing, and my surplus of blogposts are dwindling – it’s almost scary.

I’ve always pride myself for being able to hold a job, write a blog and spending time with the people who matter. But it seems that of late, all strands of inspiration has left me. I feel that I’ve lost the urge to write about travelling – be it what I’ve seen on the road. After all, there is only so much adjectives you can use to describe one European church from another.

Overcoming a writer’s block

I’ve shared this with Friends and they said, perhaps it’s time to take a break. And it’s probably what I’ll do in the coming weeks. So farewell my dear readers. The Travelling Squid will be back in mid Jan 2015.

During this time, she will be actively meeting up with friends and reading books, hoping to soak up as much inspiration from them.

Till then, take care and here’s to a happy 2015.

P.S If you have any inspirational books to recommend, please holler!