I lost my blogging mojo for a while there, just like I lost my t’ai chi mojo about 10 years ago.
I used to go faithfully to t’ai chi every week. I worked up from the beginners’ class to the continuing class. I went to intensives and weekend workshops. I even thought about training to be an instructor.
Then I moved further away from the class. I missed a couple of weeks then just fell out of the habit.
When I started my blog I wrote once a week. One New Year I decided to write something every day. I lasted four months then went on holiday and didn’t blog for a week. It was bliss. No sitting looking at a blank screen while the rest of the family watched the telly. No constantly looking for ideas. No bind.
But with both activities there was something niggling at the back of my mind. T’ai chi was good for my body and soul. Blogging was good for my art.
So a month ago I went back to the beginners’ t’ai chi class and tonight I’m back at my blog.
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When I went back to t’ai chi there had been changes – even subtler, tinier changes, imperceptible to a spectator. For the other beginners in the class they were doing these moves for the first time but for me it’s a struggle.
A struggle to remember to add a slight twist in the hand.
A struggle to change the emphasis ever-so-slightly on a shift of weight.
A struggle to unlearn old moves.
But that’s the point of t’ai chi. Learning the moves is a journey. Toaist t’ai chi is a constantly changing form – if it didn’t change it would be dead. Getting annoyed with yourself while you learn is pointless – you need to tame the tiger inside.
When I opened up WordPress there had been changes too – subtle ones, all to make the user’s life easier and make the journey more intuitive.
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Subtle changes on a website – the kind that are just fiddling round the edges – can be infuriating for the user. Move a call to action from the left hand side to the right and it flummoxes.
Move around the things that no-one looks at and no one will notice.
But look at the complete customer journey and make changes those to suit the customer and suddenly their lives are easier. Change your back-office processes to fit digital and suddenly everyone’s lives are easier. Processes that started life on paper need radical changes to fit into the digital agenda.
People might not like change but make change too subtle and everyone slips back into their old ways – learned behaviour is easy behaviour.
So go on – rock the boat, ruffle some feathers, crack some eggs.
Once the dust has settled everyone will wonder what the fuss was all about.

A song from me to you