a numbers game
For someone who says she doesn't care about numbers, I sure do get caught up in them too much!
I know that numbers aren't the measure of success, but without anything else that feels real (comments by friends, or something like that) it's the only thing I've got when it comes to seeing if I've done a good job. But that's silly to think about when it comes to writing a personal blog post - should my priority really be to have others think I did a good job?
Maybe. I mean, I can say "I'm posting for me!!!!!!!" all I want, but in my heart of hearts I know I still want the side benefit of connecting to people. The reason I started blogging, besides it being an exercise in semi-public self-expression, was because I loved reading other personal blogs (not even about anything relevant to me! just their lives!) and started my own in the hopes that I'd participate in that ecosystem somehow. I do want people to relate or at least get some entertainment out of my posts, even if that's not The Main Thing I'm Gunning For.
But if I'm not careful, I could get too caught up in trying to see that in the numbers. And honestly, I still flip-flop pretty often re: if I want to be perceived that closely or not.
So from hereon out, I'm making my posts undiscoverable, baby! If anyone reads my posts, I'll never know. I'll just have to trust that they're out there. And when I don't want them to be there, I'll also trust that they're not there. Easy fix for now.
Edit 4/27: Eh, I feel a little less insane now. Maybe as a compromise I'll leave it up for some time after I post and then turn off discovery at a certain point.