Life, Lately and Upcoming Travel Plans

Pizza, anyone? Fitzroy in Melbourne.

I’ve been blogging on Birdgehls for almost four years now and recently did something I’ve not actually done in all this time – I took a break.

Not a complete break – I’ve published one post in the last five weeks. But I’ve barely spent any time on this blog. I haven’t been fretting over Pinterest, I’ve barely been on Facebook and I’ve deleted Instagram for the second time in the last year, probably for good this time.

And I have to say… I feel pretty bloody fantastic.

This blog is far from being a full-time gig for me – I have one of those already and I’ve been enjoying it quite a bit. But my current contract is also quite exhausting – the workload is huge and it requires an expanse of creativity to get the job done.

Creative people will know it’s not like a tap you can just turn on. I find it hard enough to keep the juices flowing at work (that doesn’t sound at all right, but hopefully you know what I mean). By the time I get home, the last thing I feel like doing is spending more time in front of a computer.

Something had to give and it wasn’t going to be work, yoga, sleep or reading. That left writing and this blog.

The break’s been good, in that I’ve had moments to actually think about the direction of Birdgehls. I was getting a bit obsessed with numbers at the start of the year – which were remaining static, despite all the efforts I was pouring into Pinterest and SEO. Typically, after taking a break my numbers are rising, which is just serving to show how useless worrying about them was.

I’m not quite ready to come back to blogging full time – I still have a month of my work contract left and I really don’t fancy forcing myself to burn out over this period of time. That being said, there are recent stories that I still wish to tell – particularly involving Melbourne.

The city opened its doors recent during an “Open House Melbourne” event, which I tried to make the most of. I’ve explored new suburbs and there’s been a few events happening that deserve to be put into prose.

Moody Melbourne.

As for upcoming travel plans, I have two destinations planned for the tail end of this year.

In October, I’ll be hot footing it to New Zealand for the first time in well, ever. I’m particularly excited about this trip – my interest in our (Australia’s) southern neighbour has only grown in the last couple of years and in visiting I’ll be successfully ticking off the three travel goals I made upon returning to Australia – venturing to Southeast Asia for the first time alongside visiting every state and territory.

It’s nice to know that by November I’ll be able to say “done and done and done”.

Speaking of November, the destination weddings are in full swing and I’ll be travelling to attend one in Goa, India. I’m part Indian (a smidge, really), but it’ll be my first visit to the country of my forefathers and mothers and I’m quietly excited about experiencing it in the flesh.

Recommendations for both countries are very welcome!

So, that’s where things stand at the moment. I’m hoping to be back in late September/early October with a heck-tonne of new content. Yet, it’s been really nice to take a step back and re-evaluate what is of most importance in life. And I don’t feel sad that the blog didn’t quite make the cut. It’s strangely empowering in its own way.

But, that’s a post for another day.