What's powering this blog
I’ve finally bitten the bullet and started a blog. There are several reasons for this, which I’ll outline in the sections below. I’ll also share the tech I used to create and host the blog itself. Hopefully, this can serve as inspiration for others to start their own writing journey too!
Reason 1 - Skill Development
While reading is something I attribute the utmost importance to, writing is also a crucial skill for any professional—I firmly believe so. Being able to articulate yourself using the written word in a way that is not only concise but also conveys all the relevant information needed is a powerful skill. Not only does it help in the immediate situation, whether it be explaining a complex topic, providing supporting evidence, or simply telling a story, it also serves as a permanent resource that you or anyone else with access to a copy can refer back to in perpetuity.
Typically, writing produces the artifact itself—a written record of something. However, it can also be used as a tool to prepare for a speech, script a video, or better understand a topic yourself through note-taking. It shapes your thinking in a way that helps you better absorb and share information. In fact, reading the writing of others (books, blogs, or anything really) is extremely important, as mentioned from a learning point of view, but it also helps improve your own writing skills.
I’m not alone in this belief—many others over the years have shared how effective writing is for personal growth and career development. I won’t list links that support my take but instead challenge you, the reader, to search for something like “importance of writing for professionals” and see for yourself.
Reason 2 - Knowledge Base
Over nearly 15 years in my career, I’ve found myself sharing many of the same things repeatedly. It could be in the form of an informal discussion or sometimes as a written email or wiki page, but I rarely reused any of this except from memory. However, each time, I often wished I could reference what I shared in the past—and that’s one of the goals of this blog.
I hope to create an archive of resources with as much ‘evergreen’ content as possible—content that is fairly ‘timeless’ in that it is always valuable and can be shared now or 10 years from now. That being said, I will likely also discuss more contemporary matters, such as specific technologies that I’m excited about or current affairs in life or the industry, but more as a matter of working on the other two reasons for this blog.
If I find the written forms of these knowledge dumps to be less effective in conveying the ideas, it also opens up an opportunity to explore other avenues for reshaping this content into other media, such as video content.
Reason 3 - Reaching More People
I’ve heard numerous times that I add a lot of value and help others grow through the knowledge and teachings I’ve shared—and I’m finally starting to believe it. My next thought is: could this help more people than just those I work with? Only one way to find out! Without taking the leap and putting it out there, I’ll never know, and if not a single person gets value out of this blog, I’ll at least have satisfied my curiosity!
One of the best ways I’ve heard this put is from Jayme Edwards in his video on content creation that really spoke to me—sometimes the way a specific person describes a problem or solution can resonate with individuals in a way that no other content creator could. I would consider it a win if the content I create helps even one other individual in their growth and development!
The Tech
There’s not much going on here—at least as of writing this in January 2025. This site and its content are built using:
That’s pretty much it! I write the content in markdown files, generate the site statically, and host it on Cloudflare Pages.
I wanted to keep it simple and focus on writing, instead of using the blog as an excuse to also learn how to build something. I would likely get lost in the weeds of deciding on specific libraries or playing with fancy tools instead of focusing on my goal of creating content.
I recommend those reading this who want to create content to do the same—focus on creating the content and not on the details of how. Pick something that works and go for it!