How to Get Back Into Posting Online After a Break: 9 Mindset Tips From a Self-belief Coach

If you’re struggling to get back online after a break as a small creative business owner, then this post is for you.

I'm a self-belief coach for introverted creatives, and I'm going to share nine tips for making the transition back online a little bit easier after some time off.

I'm not a social media or marketing expert or strategist. These are very much mindset tips to help you to get back online after a pause.

If you’d prefer to watch or listen to this blog post, see the video below 😊

It’s okay to take breaks from social media

First of all, acknowledging that having a break is perfectly okay. None of us can be on all the time, especially as introverts. We can't be online and being visible a hundred percent of the year. So having a little break and stepping back from time to time is perfectly natural and necessary.

In the UK, we're just coming out of summer. So I personally have had a good month offline. And I know lots of fellow creative business owners have as well. So now it's September, we're looking to get back online, but feeling a little bit stuck with that. So I hope that these nine tips will help.

One | Don’t beat yourself up

The first step is to start with forgiveness. Forgive yourself for having ghosted your people or disappeared offline. It's completely okay to have done that. What's happened has happened. We don't need to dwell on that or to beat ourselves up, which can be our natural default, particularly as sensitive introverts. Stop with the beating yourself up and start with forgiving yourself.

Two | Know it’s not just you

Tip number two is to acknowledge that you are not alone in this. So many people struggle with this visibility thing and showing up online, particularly coming back after a break. This is about actually letting yourself know that and reassuring yourself that other people face this same challenge, even people that you look up to and people who make it look easy. I promise you, they will have their moments of also struggling with this!

So the reason this is a good practice is because it comes from a mindful self compassion model from Dr. Kristin Neff. It's called “common humanity.” It’s about tapping into this idea that we all struggle with the same things and that can help us to kind of relieve the pressure on ourselves and ultimately be kinder to ourselves.

Three | Be intentional

Tip number three is to use this opportunity to check in with whether you actually want to be on social media or not, because it might be that this isn't just a pause, but this is actually the beginning of you moving away from social media for whatever reason. So try not to just default to, I "should" be on social media, I need to come back and feeling pressure and expectation to do that, but actually listen to yourself and decide intentionally that you want to be there.

If not, then you can look at other ways to kind of replace that in your marketing. Because we all need to show up in some capacity, right? Whether that's in person networking or doing more email marketing or blogging or YouTube. We have to replace social media with something if we're going to take it out of the mix, but just to have that conversation with yourself, do you want to be there? And if so, how do you want it to feel and how do you want to go about it?

Four | Get it all out

Tip number four is allow yourself to say out loud, or maybe write down, all of your worst fears about coming back online.

It could be “I'm gonna get cancelled,” or “I'm worried about getting trolled,” or, “I'm going to be judged,” there could be all sorts of reasons that we have just under surface that we're not admitting to ourselves.

And when you actually see that list written out, or you hear yourself say it out loud in a voice note, or perhaps to a friend, you'll realise, actually, it really makes a lot of sense that I have resistance to showing up online when all of these fears are just under the surface. So, allow yourself to purge all of that stuff and get it out so that you know what you're working with, and then you can make the intentional choice to show up from a different kind of headspace.

Five | See the bigger picture

Tip number five is instead of thinking about this first post back in isolation, which all that does is just add pressure for it to kind of "perform well" and do well in terms of engagement and vanity metrics. Whereas, if you think of it as one small piece of the puzzle that you're going to be adding to, building up the overall picture over time, a bit more like a body of work. It just takes the pressure off this first one having to be good. And you can just put something out there just to get back in the swing. And the quality of your stuff will build back up later. That's not important right now. It's just important to show up in some way.

Six | Never apologise

Tip number six is to ignore any thoughts of having to explain or justify and especially apologise for being away in the first place. A lot of the lovely, sensitive, big-hearted introverts that I work with feel this need to xplain themselves and to say, “Sorry, I've not been here, these are all my reasons why…”

And actually, you don't owe anyone that information. You can just turn up and say, “Hi, I'm excited to be here again!” or not even that, just post something that doesn't draw attention to the fact that you've been away. Because like I say, nobody is expecting that information from you. People are busy, they're living their own lives. They're not noticing whether we're online or not. And even if they do notice, it doesn't mean we need to explain ourselves. So, no apologising, just turn back up and do your thing.

Seven | Lower the bar

Number seven is give yourself permission for your first post or your first few posts back to be a bit rubbish. We often default to this high standard and high bar of, “I have to say something really groundbreaking.” "I have to change someone's day, or change someone's life with what I post and it needs to be really interesting and get lots of engagement,” and all these kinds of things that we expect our content to do, and actually we don't need to expect any of that stuff.

And all that does is add pressure and stops us from accessing the creativity that we need to actually post the thing. So definitely give yourself permission to do a bad post! Maybe even aim for the worst post you can do and see what happens! Because you're much more likely to be able to actually get something out there if that's the kind of thing you're aiming for.

Eight | Seek inspiration offline

Number eight is to not trick yourself or fall into the trap of using doom scrolling as "looking for inspiration." I think we all do this and we think, “Oh, I'll just go and have a little scroll through some reels, see if it sparks any ideas.”

And actually quite often that has the opposite effect (and sends us into a confidence-sapping comparison spiral.) So I really encourage you not to look on the platform that you're hoping to post on for inspiration because that can just lead to you still sitting there an hour later and then you feel terrible about yourself because you haven't done the thing that you went to do.

So, look in at other places for inspiration. For me, something that really helps me feel inspired and feel excited and feel like I have ideas again, is to speak to a friend. So have a conversation with someone, maybe strike up a chat with a stranger in the coffee shop line, or watch a film, go for a walk, go to a gym class, do some kind of hobby that you enjoy that doesn't involve screens.

Do anything that might spark some inspiration and not because you're kind of forcing it and seeking ideas (like “I’m going to watch this film because it's going to give me an idea.” or “I'm going to read this book because I'm going to feel inspired after.”), but just do that stuff anyway to allow your brain to relax. And then the ideas can emerge on their own. So, avoid Instagram for inspiration and seek your inspiration elsewhere.

Nine | Let it be fun again!

And my final tip, number nine, is to just have fun! Social media can be a really fun, creative outlet and somewhere that you get to be a bit more playful and just enjoy marketing. So, if the fun has been drained out of it for you, and this idea of coming back after a break is creating a sense of dread or you're just not looking forward to it, maybe that's an invitation to use this opportunity to bring the fun back in and bring a more playful and lighthearted attitude and approach to it.

What would that be like? If there were no rules and you could just post whatever you wanted in whatever way you wanted, what would that look like? What would you talk about? What would you post? And just let yourself be creative in that sense and see what comes out.

Summary

So to recap, if you're struggling to get back on Instagram or on social media after a break, here are my nine top tips for doing that. Number one, forgive yourself for having disappeared. It's okay. Don't beat yourself up.

Number two, acknowledge that you're not alone in this.

Number three, check in with whether you actually want to be there, or if you're doing it because you feel like you should.

Number four, allow yourself to say out loud or write down everything you're worried might go wrong, just to see what you're working with.

Number five, don't think about this post in isolation, think about one tiny piece of the bigger puzzle.

Six, ignore any thoughts about having to apologise, justify or explain; just come back.

Seven, give yourself permission to post something rubbish initially.

Number eight, look outside of the platform you're posting on for inspiration.

And number nine, have fun. Allow yourself to actually enjoy it and do something that you want to do. Be creative, be playful and hopefully you will be back in the flow anytime now!

I hope that's been useful. Share this post with a brilliant creative business owner friend who's struggling to get back online after a break 🧡

If you’d like some one-to-one support getting out of a social media rut, my one-off Lightning Sessions are perfect for this.