Looking through Twitter, I came across an incredibly well timed post by Greg Storey reflecting on another post by Julia Evans.
Honestly, considering where I’ve been with this blog and if I hadn’t known better, I thought they were both writing to me directly!
Just this week I wrote about how I kept coming back to the word “value” and how difficult it was to identify an audience for my blog as a result. As Julia states, “it’s hard to identify which things you know will be useful to other people!”. Yesterday I decided, at a minimum, I could find value for myself.
Learning is the Struggle
I can see that I’ve been missing out on a myriad of opportunity over the last couple of years.
I’ve learned everything from technical skills to soft social skills. I’ve processed through some past trauma and worked through major life events. Really, I have added so much to myself that knowing who I am or what I have become has been difficult to identify. Sure, I’m still a soon to be husband and father, but not having an identify steeped in a strong foundation has made learning that much more difficult.
If you can’t see the connect between what you are learning and what you are doing, are you really ever learning?
I’m all for learning for learning sake, but not drawing connections makes me feel as if I’m missing out on something. It’s a hollow space.
Here’s an example. I read a book and took a course on SQL in 2019. I was told, “This is good knowledge and you’re really going to need this”. It’s been 2 years and I have yet to use SQL. I doubt that I could now, but I still have a general sense of how to run SQL queries. I definitely couldn’t build a SQL architecture. The knowledge feels wasted.
This might be the reason why I’ve gravitated towards learning the 7 Habits. Covey’s ideas are grounded in the everyday occurrences of life. Though I’ve struggled to implement, I have not struggled to grasp their value.
Struggle Every Day
This is the reason to keep blogging. Just through writing this post have I remembered why I continue to think about blogging (even if I’ve been struggling to write/focus posts). The value in writing is the value in reflection.
Without reflecting on experiences, they fade away into the past. There isn’t a grounding effect. There isn’t a moment where you say, “that’s where I learned…”. Sure, some experiences are much faster to reflect on and don’t need 200-600 words, but some experiences take months or years to reflect on.
Learning, like recovery, is trying to get a little better every day. It doesn’t have to be all at once, but just 1% a day makes a difference. I learned that last year from a wise friend.
Finishing Thoughts
I realize now that I need to blog about my struggles and what I’m learning from them. The posts this week have revealed that value. I think I’ll continue trying to blog every day. If anything, I’m trying to learn how to be more intentional with my blogging (by extension more intentional with my learning).
Side note: The picture is from a game called Black Angel. Greg Storey recommended it. Considering I mentioned him at the beginning of the post, I though it only right to have a picture of me playing the game. It took us 4 days to learn how to play. It’s not a difficult game. It has just been a difficult week, but we pressed on and enjoyed playing. Thank you Greg for the recommendation.
We’ll, I’ve added something to my everyday rhetoric repertoire. Hope you did as well. Thank you for reading.