Throughout the Summer and into Autumn I was reading and writing prolifically. My Google Search Central stats were soaring, my GoodReads challenge was almost in hand and generally, I had quite lofty ideas of what this blog was going to become. Would I start a YouTube channel alongside this? Would I start creating reels on Instagram about the amount of pages I read in a week? Would I hit 1,000 clicks by the end of 2024 and buy some champagne to celebrate? Let’s not call this being unrealistic, let’s call this manifesting.
It’s fantastic the amount of things you can get done in your 5-to-9 when you are unfulfilled in your 9-to-5. I was lacking a creative outlet, a challenge and something tangible to reach for. This blog gave me that. Hitting goals, seeing the numbers lift, enjoying the process – reading writing, photographing, editing, posting, optimising, maintaining. All this made me realise that’s how a 9-5 should feel the majority, not minority, of the time.
So I changed jobs. I changed lifestyles in the process. No longer rolling out of bed and into the home office in the next room. Instead, I am up and walking into the city centre five times a week. Juggling my emotional life events alongside supporting my partner (and vice versa), having a semblance of a social life, keeping the house clean, yadda yadda yadda. My 9-to-5 has become a place of new friendships, new learnings, new joy and new fulfillment. It’s become a place so full that reading and writing (and some other hobbies) have gotten lost in the process.
It’s just a learning curve. 2025 will bring a renewed sense of organisation. A promise to achieve a mountain of resolutions and a new Notion board to help me scale them. This blog hasn’t stopped, it’s just been on pause. In the same way the leaves have fallen from the trees, so the words have fallen off the keyboard. They’ll grow again soon though and then, maybe I’ll hit those 1,000 clicks. The Goodreads challenge though… I fear that will be left as mulch.