100,000 Words

I am now at 100,000 words on JoshuaRust.com. I’ve written roughly a novel. It’s incredible how persistent movement towards a goal can create a grand accomplishment. I never set out to hit any goal when I started this blog. I just wanted to write reports on all of the helpful books I was reading, and post some other thoughts/analysis, as a way to learn. I wanted it to be more of a professional tool I could use to showcase what I was doing and help me elucidate where I wanted to go with it. I started writing about places we went as a family, posting pictures I took of things I thought were interesting, and sharing some information about who I am. Now I hope to print all of this stuff out into a book one day so my kids can read it after I’m gone. I plan on leaving a huge paper trail for them. Having lost my father and not knowing much about him is my main inspiration for doing so. I am curious what they’ll discover about me in doing so.

I never designed the site as a source of income, although I dabbled with product placement (subsequently discarded when Amazon crushed their referral program). In fact, even when I wrote fly fishing blogs I never loaded up my site with advertisements. I kind of wanted it to be my own thing and that was it. It’s hard to be editorially honest in those instances. I pay a monthly fee to host the blog and when that credit card stops paying this site gets blown away. At least I have control over everything here, unlike social media, which adds and subtracts features you might like and are just looking to mine your relationships and data for selling points.

Overall, blogging is fun. If I had a better voice, I’d probably do a podcast. If I was more photogenic, maybe a vlog. I just happen to enjoy writing, and I am trying to get better at it. Writing well is a powerful means of communication, and the more you write the better you get at expressing yourself. If you can find a more powerful tool in today’s world with positive effects on one’s life other than communicating well, then I’d like to know. Everything we do as humans boils down to communication. We are at our core social animals, and if you can’t get your point across or influence others than you’ll struggle accomplishing your goals. I used to be so self conscious about my writing, so doing so here is a big step for me. In college I could not write well, and I ultimately left the liberal arts because of it and went into business instead, which ultimately led me into technology.

What really got this blog’s size up was committing to posting at least 500 words every Tuesday. I did this for over four years. To get there, I decided to just write about whatever I wanted to write about and not get hung up on editing after a few passes I’ve been told my grammar isn’t the best, but you can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. If I had money I’d hire an editor, which would really add value to this blog, but I do it alone because its a labor of love anyway.

Thanks for reading!