No ask this time, just reflections and observations. First and foremost, it’s been amazing to see people around the world find my blog content helpful. I published my first post mid-2019, and I’ve consistently posted at least twice a month since. Little by little, I feel that my writing and presentation skills have improved as the blog has grown.
Honestly, sharing my thoughts with a worldwide audience was never my goal. Originally, I simply posted to document what I was working on at the moment. If someone found it helpful, then that was a bonus. Still, taking a step back and actually looking at the blog’s growth, it is a lot. Thank you for everyone that has found my blog’s content helpful.
However, today’s reflection is actually about my blog’s “All-time insights.” Between October 2023 and July 2024, there is a noticeable dip in monthly views. Being the data nerd that I am, my curiosity was piqued. “What was I doing before the dip? What was I doing during the dip?” Well, mentioning this to my wife and her not missing a beat, she answered, “Your momma died.” So yeah, I was spending time with my dying mother, then grieving that she died on me.
We hear it all the time, everyone handles grief differently. Which isn’t wrong, but it isn’t spoken about enough that we need to actually take time and grieve. It may be coincidence and not causation, but given that the timeline aligns so perfectly, losing my mother may be the missing context to the above data trend.
In hindsight, I could have taken a break from blogging. I was just going through the motions, and the data seems to support that. My mother was sick for months before she passed, and it took me several more months to process her death. I continued to blog, threw myself into certifications, did more public speaking, hosted more training sessions, etc. Everything would have still been there even if I properly took time to grieve. So, my plea for everyone, take the time to process loss. Take the time to grieve. The work, the projects, and the blogs, it will all still be there when you’re done.
Conclusion:
Take the time to process grief. It won’t necessarily make the grief go away, but the load will get easier.
Happy birthday, mom!
#MiddleChild
“Liberation lies within us and will not be formed from the current institutional structures we have in place for it never has.”
Fatimata Cham
#BlackLivesMatter
console.log('Charles'); 