Stop — Maybe You Shouldn’t Write A Blog Post Today

I once heard Gary Vee say you need to make 10–30 pieces of content per day for Twitter.

That wasn’t the end.

He also said we needed to create about “30 pieces of content” combined for Youtube, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat per day.

It was ridiculous hearing him say this. All in all, he was expecting people to create 50–100 pieces of new content per day.

He wasn’t forcing anyone to do this, but what if we love Gary Vee and want to follow all of his advice? We might feel like we MUST write every single day to keep up.

Should we mindlessly publish every day?

Well, I’d urge you to publish as often as possible, but you don’t HAVE to. In this age of publish more, more, more, there are gray areas that need to be considered.

First, It’s A Privilege To Post Anything Online

When I go over to the Philippines, I see some ridiculous sh*t. Eighty percent of the people I sit down with to have a legitimate conversation have the most interesting stories.

They grew up in the mountains. They’re making $10 per day. They sell coconut water on the streets with a machete. They find it extremely difficult to make ends meet. They literally just need some shoes.

I would love to hear more of their story online, but they don’t have access to a computer, or a phone, to talk about their life.

I don’t think people really realize that it’s a privilege to talk about your life online. Just the fact that I can write this blog post and within a moment 1,000 people could instantly see it is ridiculous.

With that said, there’s a duty that comes with publishing online.

Lesson: Creators should see this as a privilege instead of an exercise in whimsically posting things without thinking about it to “grow” or hit quotas.

You Know When It Just Isn’t Good.. So Don’t Publish It

The other day I thought about posting a video to Facebook about the Philippines. I wrote the script, edited it, and spent about 4 hours of my life on it. Then it completely fell apart on the editing room table.

It just, *sigh*, it just wasn’t good.

I could’ve finished the video. I could’ve made it work and half-heartedly uploaded it later that day, but I didn’t feel comfortable with that.

Then I thought about it.. I made that video so fast because I gave myself a goal to make 2 new videos for Facebook that week.

I let the amount of content get in the way of the quality of it.

And what’s worse is I felt like a failure afterwards because I had only published one video that week instead of two. I should’ve felt GREAT, though, because I made the right choice.

Lesson: Be proud for not publishing something that’s only partly good. It was the right decision.

You Have To Love Your Blog Post Topic — If You Don’t, You Shouldn’t Bother

I have a theory that you’ll never go viral if you don’t love your topic with all your heart. If you’re not in love with your message, it doesn’t even matter.

Now, I don’t mean 60% in love. I don’t mean “I kind of like this idea.”

I mean you have to be full blown 100% in love with whatever you’re saying in order for it to go mega viral.

So if you’re judging internet superstars and thinking that MAYBE they’re not being genuine.. they are. To me, you won’t become a superstar if you don’t believe in what you’re saying one hundred percent.

My best-performing videos that got millions of views were all videos I “felt” a little more than the others emotionally. So use the anger, frustration, stress, love, hate, joy, etc. to write with.

Lesson: You’re beating a dead horse trying to force your blog posts. They won’t be your best if you didn’t love writing them.

Chill The Heck Out, Refusing To Publish Is A Win

Look at this as a win. You did good. You showed some character and chose to not publish something. I felt like that needed to be said because I so often encourage writers to publish OFTEN when in fact there are some occasions you shouldn’t.

Don’t Be Too Afraid, Though

This blog post is more of a reminder than a field guide. I don’t want you to use this as an excuse to all of a sudden post once per month instead of once or twice per week.

My thinking is, you’ll have those moments once in a while where you know what you’re writing isn’t that great.

You’ll have those days. Don’t worry about them. Stop writing, give your mind a break, allow it to think about other things, and maybe a topic you really love will rise up from the ashes.