Personal blogging dilemma: Your blog is your resume, unless you blog too personally.

I’m taking a break from lemonandlively.com to pursue a new blog that’s more lifestyle than it is personal in the context of my previous personal blogging style. I know. Shocker.

Shock face in red lipstick
I had a lot of fun taking random reaction selfies.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, and I always considered my blog to be a place that would help me grow both personally and professionally, but it’s not a place of both for me. I can’t use my blog as a resume because people are going to see that I’m autistic or have dissociative identity disorder and presume that I am mentally unstable.

That’s the way that it is. I don’t like it, but I’m realizing lately that I need to be in a position of authority and credibility without the dissociative identity disorder or a childhood trauma aspects. It’s complete crap, but companies view me and people like me as a liability or someone who needs to be institutionalized even though I’m of sound mind.

If I want to erect the change that I want to make happen in this world, I need to separate myself from this part of me.

It’s always going to be on the internet; people who want to find it can definitely find it.

But more than that, it’s not inherently professional. I’m not the type of person, and in the type of position, who has the privilege of defining her own professionalism and still being taken seriously.

I essentially have zero power at all.

I’m already deciding to go with the TikTok trend of being delusional to make my dreams come true, so the last thing that I need is this blog holding me back.

Before I ever even knew what it was, I wanted to be a content creator. Georgie has been saying something for years that she heard from somewhere else, about how future jobs haven’t even been invented yet.

I’ve always felt like that was me. I don’t fit into most positions out there, with my skill set, and I’ve always known that I would need to make my own way in terms of my career. Though college isn’t exactly autistic-friendly, the autistic special interests do tend to resemble the knowledge gained from a college degree. That doesn’t do anything to help me, because employers don’t get it. You’re not supposed to mention that you are autistic. As soon as I find out, they view it as a negative, a liability, something that discredits everything you have said.

I have a major, radical, delusional dreams about creating an environment where people can come together to create, from different backgrounds and economic statuses, and learn to make something of themselves. I think I’m even keen to make that happen here, surrounded by small towns, because rural areas don’t get that many opportunities. Their internet sucks, and schools only get so much funding, mainly for sports. People who want to escape rural life, for whatever reason, settle for jobs in major cities they have to drive hours to. After it’s all said and done, they spend 60 hours a week working or driving to and from work.

I have no idea what that looks like or how it’s going to work completely, but I do know that I can’t accomplish any of that by staying here. I can’t make any of that happen by continuing to just be a personal blogger and relying on old blogging strategies.

My childhood was surrounded by money issues, bankruptcy, and loads and loads of debt. Staying here is just driving me more and more into that path. I am going to break the cycle or die trying.

Several years were spent trying to do both — be a personal blogger and keep hobby bloggers happy because I wasn’t “drinking the Kool-Aid” while also attending events and working with sponsors towards a whole different life and reality.

First of all, the entire concept of drinking the Kool-Aid is extremely problematic.

Second, I focused on keeping other people happy at the expense of my own happiness.

Why does it matter how somebody else lives their life if it doesn’t directly affect you? Why does it matter that you’re annoyed about something somebody else is doing if it’s what makes them happy?

Through boundaries, I have learned that I am not in charge of how other people feel. It’s not my job to manage other people’s emotions, including annoyance or sadness. There is so much personal growth in being single.

You don’t rely on somebody else to do anything, because you have to do it all yourself. You don’t owe your time to anybody, and you’re not responsible for how your partner feels. Even in relationships, with boundaries, you’re not responsible for how your partner feels. This might be why my experience with dating apps suck. Most everyone is on there looking for happiness with somebody else, while feeling lonely and sad and depressed and unwanted. I’m not looking to fill any void because every void of mine is filled. I’m just looking for someone to enjoy spending time with.

But now I’m rambling.

I moved into a new apartment, in a new town. I moved with only a few furniture pieces, because I wanted all new furniture. That, of course, takes a while so I don’t have furniture yet for the most part. I have a bed frame, a new mattress, a chair that I sit in, a bar stool that I use to work on my laptop at my kitchen peninsula, and a few other functional storage pieces.

I know lots of people who think that that’s not right, who think that I have made a series of mistakes, but I actually like that I don’t have furniture yet. I have the time to look through what I have, pare down on things that I literally haven’t even looked at in years, and decide which pieces I actually want.

The idea of spending money on things that I don’t actually need or want, just to have those things, doesn’t even make sense to me anymore.

I’m not a new person. I’m just sick of living life the same way that I’ve always been living it.

It’s not resulting in a different me, it’s just resulting in a constant pattern on repeat.

I’m tired of not going after what I want, of not taking chances.

I’m tired of apologizing for things that I’m not sorry for, just to make other people happy.

Most of all, I’m tired of me standing in my own way because I’m stuck in a loop of trauma responses.

So. My personal blog is finally growing in traffic by 1k+ page views each month. I’ve read somewhere multiple times that this is considered success and what I should aspire for.

It’s not.

I’ve grown blogs and online businesses quickly in the past for people who just took advantage of me because I didn’t know how to market myself or ask for the sale or sell anything.

I regret spending so much time helping other people that I didn’t work on building my own castle.

Not anymore.

🏰

My new blog is low-key set up, with a theme I created in the past, at XO, IZZY. I was tempted to use this one, but it’d likely confusing. I will be purchasing a theme that I’ve fallen in love with in the next few weeks.

Instead of niching down, I have three main focuses:

  • neurodivergent (ND) individuals who desperately want ND life hacks, simplified adulting guides, and autonomy outside of live-to-work culture
  • anyone who wants to unlearn unconscious ableism, or learn more about life with neurodiversity
  • local traffic, at least 10 percent over the next few years, because of that aforementioned delusional dream

But everyone is welcome.

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