I first started blogging when I was 30 years old.
I had no prior experience or knowledge of SEO.
It was my first time building a website.
I still remember the anxiety I felt after I started.
“How embarrassing is it that I have a blog.”
Not long before I started this journey, even I thought blogging was lame.
In my mind, blogs were just public journals where people shared what they ate for dinner the night before.
If that was my impression of blogging, what would my friends and family think of it?
The topic I chose to write about was also kind of lame.
“Why hadn’t I picked something cooler to write about?”
“What if my writing sucks?”
“How will I explain to everyone what I’m even doing, or why I’m doing it?”…
“No you see, I’m not writing this article because I want to necessarily, I’m writing it because this particular keyword gets searched a lot in Google each month and if I can rank for it people will come to this page and then I can monetize the page in the future with display ads that earn about 40-50 dollars per 1000 visitors.”
“What if I do all this work and spend all this time and still fail?”
All of these thoughts/fears/worries, while silly in hindsight, where very real to me back then.
I actually believed that friends and family might find and read my blog, and then judge me for it.
Turns out, I didn’t have to worry about anyone in the world reading any of my content for the first 180 days.
But worries aside, I got hooked on learning something new.
Even the little things were challenging early on.
Hell, connecting my domain name to my host felt like an adventure.
I loved going from one day to the next, solving problems.
Continuously moving the ball forward – even if it was only a little bit.
Now, 3 years later, that blog has been one of the most successful, and professionally fulfilling things I’ve done to date.
It’s opened up lots of different doors and opportunities for me.
I see a future that never would have existed had I not started that blog.
And I owe all of it to being open, and willing to try something new – other people’s judgement and opinions be damned.
So now, when I see people giving someone sh*t who is trying something new and in the process of learning, I have a visceral reaction to it.
Even if that somebody is a Billionaire.
Even if that somebody is Mark Zuckerberg.
I think it’s fair to say Zuck is pretty universally unpopular at this point.
He’s borderline hated.
And obviously Mark doesn’t need me sticking up for him. Or anyone else for that matter.
He’s worth 85 Billion dollars.
He’ll be just fine.
But for a moment, put aside how you might feel about him, and his business.
This isn’t really about Mark.
Or Meta.
This is about being willing to try new things.
Being vulnerable.
Putting yourself out there, not knowing what the outcome will be.
Sill learning and growing, even as you get older.
Even after you’ve already made say, 85 Billion dollars.
In the interaction above, an account posted a video of Mark “winning gold” at a Jiu Jitsu tournament.
And an anonymous commenter replied he’s sure Mark tried hiding the video, and that he should be embarrassed.
Mark started learning and practicing Jiu Jitsu for the first time during the pandemic, just a few years ago.
He’s still new to the sport.
Yes, the video is a bit awkward.
And ya, it’s pretty clear that he’s a white belt novice.
But that’s not something to be “embarrassed” about.
And I’m certain Mark isn’t.
Because Mark knows what all winners know.
Growth happens outside of comfort.
Nobody who wins big, does so comfortably.
Winners force themselves into the uncomfortable situations.
They push themselves to learn and try new things.
And they’re perfectly OK risking looking “silly”, or even “stupid” in the process.
In many ways, they don’t actually give a sh*t what other people think at all.
Ultimately their goal is to become comfortable, in these uncomfortable situations.
That’s something I really admire about Mark.
Even if there’s a lot of other stuff I don’t.
Selfishly, I wrote this as a reminder to myself.
A reminder to keep learning.
To keep pushing.
And to care what other people think just a little bit less.
Rant over.
Enjoy the weekend.
Back to our regularly scheduled programming next week.
-Mike
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