So today marks one year since my return to blogging. It’s a “sort of anniversary,” because in another way, I’ve been blogging for about 15 years one and off since the original blog began way back in 2004, but this blog has helped revive my appetite for writing for its own sake for me. I’ve not written every day, but 67 posts in a year isn’t bad.
I’ve written as long as I can remember, from made-up comic book empires as a kid to columns and articles and essays today. But it hasn’t always been easy.
I’ve gotten mired in a crisis of self-confidence about my own writing for the past few years. My journalism jobs moved from involving writing to becoming more management, editing and “content curation,” more shuffling other people’s words around than attempting my own. I got away from what I got into journalism for many moons ago – telling stories, including my own. The rise of social media, web journalism and an infinite universe of hot takes and words by other people made me start to think my own voice wasn’t really important in the content blogosphere, so why bother?
Anyway, the point is, restarting regular blogging once a week or so a year ago really helped jump-start my urge to write again. I feel better when I write something a few times a week, whatever it is. I realised that while I’m just one of a million voices on the internet, I still have something to say, and occasionally other people will read it.
Blogging regularly again made me decide to take the leap earlier this year back into part-time freelance journalism for the first time in more than a decade, and so far I’m finding it really rewarding to do. The story of my health woes published last weekend has been shared hundreds of times on social media and dozens of people have commented and emailed sharing their own emotional stories. That’s what it’s all about, really.
This blog doesn’t get a ton of traffic compared to how my old blog did back in the golden age of bloggers circa 2008, but it’s still getting readers. It’s my little corner of the internet, and I’m pretty happy with it. Thanks for reading.
Nik Dirga 
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