Holy moly! 99 blog posts consecutively let alone within a year. The question many have asked me is why write on a blog at all, let alone 100 days in a row. Over the last week or so I have been thinking about this more and more.
On one hand I have a romantic notion that the Internet and World Wide Web have this amazing potential for bringing people together. For many that seems strange that technology which allows us to sit behind a keyboard and screen could somehow bring us together. The reality is that for the vast majority of people, including myself, most of our activity online is not bringing us closer together. Most of the time we are viewing the Web. Blogging changes that and allows us to broadcast onto the web.
The current pandemic gives us the opportunity to safely communicate with each other while avoiding transmitting the virus. The problem is that we have to take a leap and put our imperfect selves out there. My colleague Jon wrote a great post today about this. With a blog the biggest cost for publishing is our time and our pride. Take an hour out of your day and get over your ego and pride and share something about yourself.
A blog is as independent as it gets. You have full control over the software used, and you can choose whom you want to host it. You can write whatever you want, post photos and images, design the layout, and share it via email, text, or even social media. No one is selling your data. It is yours to do with as you please.
In 2003 I bought my first domain and setup a WordPress blog with all of these notions. The problem is that I could not get over my pride and ego. I couldn’t find a reason to just write and publish something. Jon does a great job of breaking down why this time he was able to write consistently. He mentions that having a group to commit to helped make him stick with it and I agree. The other point was about perfection and how making this more relaxed made it easier to keep going. I agree with that big time as well.
For me this challenge has been about sticking with something but also fulfilling the idea about how blogs can bring people closer. I started working at Kinsta in February of this year. The pandemic had not been declared yet, and we were all supposed to have met up in Budapest for the annual company meetup. Then the pandemic hit and traveling anywhere let alone internationally became a bad idea. The prospect of meeting my teammates in person and bonding went out the window. How could we overcome this barrier and learn more about each other?
So a 100 day blogging challenge was born and here we are 99 days later. Even if someone didn’t post everyday of the challenge I still learned something about them outside of work, and that was the purpose. By using a blog I didn’t have to go into Slack to see what they were up to.
This post is a total rambler which probably represents most of what I have written here. The good news is that I am fine with it. I hope someone has learned something new about me besides being self centered enough to write 99 consecutive blog posts about myself. I have learned that I can write consistently. There have been days when it has been a chore to come up with something to write about. Generally those are the posts about my workout for the day.
My plan is to keep writing here daily and to keep having fun. At the very least it helps me reflect on my day. My answer for why is that we can and should use this tool to better connect with each other. My hope is to inspire anyone to setup a blog and start writing.
Here are the sites that participated in this challenge:
jonpenland.com
grant.codes
fauxzen.com
brianli.com
kuelt.csabavarga.me
balaki.me
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