Have You Reddit?

in-truth-reddit-does-indeed-have-a-bigger-audience-than-places-like-the-new-york-times-web-site.jpgI’ve been going on Reddit a lot lately and when my blog posts become ones that I’m just re-posting from Reddit, I’m not coming up with good original content. When I compare my own site to entries created by thousands of people who are smarter and more creative, not to mention they only have to think of one good idea to make a splash, how can I compete? My traffic has been going down and my formula for this site is growing stale once again. I’m in this constant vacuum of everything I do is not quite good enough. I’m honestly not sure how people deal with this on a consistent basis but I get the feeling most people don’t think about it.

Let me tell you why I suck. I should clarify that it’s not necessarily sucking as much as it’s not clearing the hump. I’m pretty good at something but never good enough to either 1) excel at it 2) make money doing it.  Many times it’s that the idea or training isn’t right.  Take Reddit and how its content is created by users.  It’s already a better platform than my site.  In skill based games, it’s having the right people teach you.    A quick list of activities that I’ve spent way too much time doing that have resulted in 0.

 

Dead Ends

RunningRunning – I enjoy running because it keeps me in shape and makes me feel good. The competitive angle is a nice quality but means nothing to me.  I may start doing a few more races just for something to do and I’m getting older, but it’s purely for enjoyment.  This is actually the most worthwhile activity on this list because MY EXPECTATION IS 0.

poker_11Poker – Playing poker could possibly be the biggest waste of time in my entire life. I’ve spent thousands of hours playing and it resulted in 0.  0 not in a dollar amount but 0 in that I neither won or loss any significant amount of money for all the time played.  This is a good example of not being good enough to overcome the real grinders and guys with too much talent.  Time spent didn’t warrant profit.

tcx2Rnningfool.com – I enjoy maintaining my website but the vision of this being anything but a pet project are fading. My analytics start May 2nd, 2009 which will be coming up to 5 years working on this site. This past period of time has been the most consistent traffic I’ve received ever. I was getting about 20,000 people a month which sounds impressive but not when you realize what pages they are visiting. It’s not like I have 20,000 people reading my homepage anxious for updates. They are people finding some picture I posted of Katy Perry or another big boobed bimbo. Over the years I know I’ve created some good posts that will just go down with the archives.  I like to look at this site as my life though and no dollar amount can be paid for my life.

stortztoolsFamily Business – This one has been killing me the most as of late. I’m sure people think working for a family business is a cake walk but you have no idea what it takes when no one is telling you what to do. I’ve poured my time and energy into this business and at the end of the day it’s not like we are making money hand over fist. It gets difficult devoting your time day in and day out to something that doesn’t pop like you really want it to.  These other examples don’t add up to a 40 hour week for 8 years straight.

 

What’s Your Point Vanessa?

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I’m in the B portion of the human population and this is not as ideal as it seems because I’m tormented by being good but never good enough.  An example, I like playing Chess but what the hell is the freaking point?  I get shit on when I play the chess geeks and the amount of time I would have to spend to get better will result in exactly 0 except personal satisfaction which only takes you so far.  At 30 years of age, there isn’t any random talent that I haven’t discovered about myself.

If you’ve read Outliers, you’d know 10,000 hours of time is what it takes to be an expert at something.  People who can spend 10,000 hours doing something have passion .  I’m a dabbler.  I don’t have one thing in particular that I’m wonderful at, I’m just mediocre in many different things and this leads to nothing.  Enjoy the activity but that’s all there is.  I’m tired of the dicking around process when I already know what the end result is.  This takes me to spending my time doing something that has a purpose.

I’m not a fake person who does things to feel better about themselves.  I would never volunteer to be a firefighter because I’d have no interest putting other people’s lives in my hands (nor getting near fires).  Leave that up to people who actually want to do that.  Which leaves me in this dark, unsettling mindset of not knowing what to do.  I spent a week traveling and that was 10x better than this shitty routine life that I’ve been living for lord knows how many years.  I think getting a taste of that made me realize how much I’m tired of this life I’ve chose.  This post should outline some frustration that I have to imagine other people feel at some point.  I’m putting my foot down an doing something about it.  I don’t know what yet, but expect some changes.