When a blog is like a diet…

I am an all or nothing person, and I’m not proud of it. When I start a no-sugar diet, for instance, the moment I blow it and eat some candy, the diet is done. I can’t seem to get beyond that failure, count it as a temporary lapse, and move on. I see it as having to start all over again.

Perhaps it’s like a football player’s stats. This season, the New England Patriot’s quarterback, Tom Brady, was about to beat a record — number of sequential games in which he threw for a touchdown. He failed. He didn’t make the throw, and he didn’t beat the record. What made it worse, to ever beat that record, he had to start all over.

That’s how dieting is for me. (And, yes, I know, it’s not a diet, it’s a lifestyle change…) Unfortunately, recently blogging became like a diet.

It’s my fault, really. I committed to NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) in November, which meant I committed to posting every day. It was difficult, and if I didn’t have a week off from school for the Thanksgiving holidays, I never would have succeeded. I did; I didn’t always like my posts, but I liked the attention. Posting daily somehow drew a crowd; the number of followers and likes and comments skyrocketed (well, compared to the previous months). When I decided to do NaBloPoMo, I thought it was for November only. But when I found out that November is merely the most popular month for NaBloPoMo (surprised it isn’t February, which is shorter) and that BlogHer offered the challenge every month, my competitive edge took that challenge for December. Two weeks off at Christmas helped me achieve that goal; when January rolled around, along with my son’s basketball season and my school’s accreditation process, I knew better than to commit to NaBloPoMo.

But I did anyway. (Hey, the theme was “pressure,” I figured posts would come quite naturally.)

Last week, just before I left for my son’s varsity game, I had almost finished a post. I was rushing and pressuring myself to get the post done before the game, and I missed the first minute and half because of it. By the time I got home from the game, it was too late to put on those finishing touches. I missed a day for NaBloPoMo.

Two days later, I missed again. Why not? I had already blown it. Just like my no-sugar diet. Just like Tom Brady’s attempted broken record.

So today, I knew I had school work and house work that simply had to get done, and blogging had to come last, if it came at all. January’s NaBloPoMo “pressure” was off me… until I thought, “Blogging is like dieting.”

And there you have it. A post. And maybe a time in my life when I am not “all or nothing.”

(Maybe because blogging is better than a diet.)