I started blogging, more for the desire to 'look from the other side' than in an effort to create income. I signed up on adsense and Amazon affiliates just to see what that was like. Before I knew it, I was looking into sponsored posts and partnerships - where the real money was at. It was like a drug and I found myself going about my day, thinking about how I could craft the next effective post.
The money was never near $30/hr, but it was the 'potential' that got addictive. I had a few posts go unexpectedly viral (one about how I was saving for college, one about my planned withdrawal strategy in ER, and one about how achieving FI paralleled Plants vs. Zombies (plant the sun flowers first, even if zombies are coming. Then go on the offense, but still max out that back row of sunflowers as quick as you can, etc.). It was fun, but became a distraction.
The blog hobby started off as fun, but personally I like my 'job' more because it was predictable, dependable income and benefits, and structured. When I call it a day and turn off my phone, I am free to do whatever the heck I want to do. And, most importantly, with my job, I don't think about it cuz' it's always there as long as I show up and do it. Pre-FI, I hated that it was always there, but post-FI, I'm kinda' amazed that they pay me so much to just do what I feel like I should do anyways at my age (help general society, pay taxes, provide valuable goods using my college degree, keep myself and my extended family healthy and reasonably provided for, and stay engaged with healthy, positive hobbies, civic duties, ambassadorship, etc.).
It's an exciting, fast-paced modern world, but I also get the sense that many new 'opportunities' quickly go from great to crap. As an arm-chair economist, I chalk this up to how quickly new 'professions' seem to fall victim to supply outstripping demand. Almost hard to remember what life was like before computers and people able to depend on a jobs for a lifetime. With years of service came respect, folks were relatively hard to replace, and productivity was soaring. And before that, before the Industrial Revolution, jobs were impossible to replace because they were not interchangeable.
I always find myself wondering, life is good, right? I mean, it's certainly not bad. I practice stoicism and mindfulness, but is that a sign that life is maybe too good? That we have to manufacture hardship? If I read another self-congratulatory, un-self-searching post about
how great faux discomfort is I'll give up entirely on reading post-FI blogs, since they obviously aren't interested in answering tough questions and their progress has ground to a halt.