I recently got an email from “Tony” asking if he could write an article on my site. He wanted to write up an article (“no charge”, he assured me) about entrepreneurship and tools.
An ad.
My immediate thought was a bit of shock… has my blog gone viral? Do I have enough traffic to warrant someone thinking they could successfully advertise on it?
After looking through my old blog posts, I revisited that old recognizable feeling of “wait, didn’t I used to do this?” And frankly, I was embarrassed.
Once again, had I let something that I love to do fall off the planet.
In my old job at the Credit Union, I used to write an all-engineers email every Friday morning. I would start it on Wednesday and then spend hours Thursday evening finishing it.
Yet once again, I couldn’t seem to break away for 20 minutes a day to write down what’s happening.
I do best in routines. I eat the same foods for breakfast / lunch, and only change up dinner because my wife doesn’t particularly appreciate eating the same things every day. I go to the gym on the same cadence every week: 4:30pm on Monday / Tuesday, and 11:30am on Wednesday through Friday, Saturday 9am, and Sunday 11am.
If something I love to do is not in my list of habits, I lose track of it.
Now, it seems I have fallen out of something I once identified with. Something that shows me to be a fraud, or not what I claim to be.
Even worse the shame remains because even while writing this I fear that I’m attempting to, once again, restate the lie that I am something of a creator. A writer.
As if doubling down on it as an identity will make blog posts happen.
I mentor folks in my job. Every day. Literally my favorite part of being a Staff engineer.
I would allow absolutely none of the people I mentor to be as harsh about themselves.
No negative self-talk: a rule I read and remember from Pete Carroll’s Win Forever. A rule I demand entirely from my mentees.
I’ve never been so much of a rule-follower.
I choose to NOT be embarrassed by these things.
Did I fail to document my learnings while working at a pet store? Yep.
Have I failed to document much of anything while working at the pet store? Yep.
Do I still have the voice I once had? Of course I do.
I’ll tell Tony that I’ll pass on the free article. I think a DYI approach to blogging might be a better way to go.
Christopher Brown's Blog 