Welcome back to another Life Update!
This is the third instalment in my Life Update Series, where I record my accomplishments from the last month.
These posts are a way for me to remain accountable to myself for future months, and as a diary of what I have achieved so far. I’ll cover statistics from my blog and X profile, as well as things I did well/ not so well throughout the month.
Things I Achieved
This month has been extremely busy. Reacquainting myself with paid employment has been challenging, and I’ve been working more days than I had planned to.
Work
Last month, I got a job after a 6 month long career break.
It’s been great to get back into work and start earning money again! I’ll talk a bit more about my strategy with the money I earn from this job in my next Life Update.
So far, the job has been exactly what I wanted and more. I’ve gained a ton of experience in software I didn’t yet have expertise in. And the people I’m working with are knowledgeable, and more importantly, very respectful.
Unfortunately, despite committing to a 4-day work week, I have had a few weeks of working 5 days due to a busy system launch. This has meant that some of my other goals have fallen down during this month, which I’ll explain later on.
I really enjoy the work, but adjusting to the volume was difficult after not working.
Created Profiles on Other Socials
Due to my new job, my content posting has slowed. Engagement on X has dropped as a result. I’ll talk about later on.
I’ve begun creating profiles on other platforms, such as Facebook and YouTube, as I’m planning on posting more on those platforms soon.
Although my focus is on my new job for now, I want to set up future content options should I choose to use them.
Continued Writing about my Personal Philosophy
I wrote and published an article last month describing my personal philosophy.
I think it’s been one of the most important things I’ve ever done.
The philosophy describes how I navigate life and what I have learned to create the lifestyle I’m living right now.
I published three articles that fit into that philosophy in April:
I plan on completing this philosophy by the end of the year.
Life Update Statistics
I’m posting the statistics of my blog and X profile for posterity. I want to capture this information so that I can see the progress from one month to the next.
It’s not my intention to get competitive about the numbers. I’m sure many accounts have grown faster than mine, and many have grown slower. The stats simply are what they are.
- Total blog posts published: 13 > 21 (+8 this month)
- Website views last month: 37 > 30 (-7 month on month)
- X posts: 560 > 668 (+108)
- X impressions for month: 12,300 > 5,000 (-60%)
- X followers: 35 > 33 (-2)
I’ve posted the stats from last month and this month, as well as the change from month to month.
These aren’t great. Stats are down on just about every metric, although I did continue publishing on my blog. I also discovered the existence of X bots, and removed a large number of followers from my profile myself.
While I am disappointed in the lower values, my priorities have shifted this month and the results show this.
Last Month’s Goals
Let’s see how I did on last month’s goals:
Consistency
Unfortunately, I failed the only goal I set for April 2024.
I wasn’t able to maintain my posting schedule of posting an article every Tuesday and Friday.
I’ve been posting every Friday instead. And even that was a challenge.
Going forward (at least while I’m working) I will be posting once weekly instead of twice weekly. Since my job is contract-based, there’s a chance that my contract could end prematurely or not lead to ongoing work. If that happens, I’ll shift my focus back to producing content.
Goals for Next Month
I have two things to focus on this month:
Consistency
I want to ensure I keep posting an article each week. If I keep this up, I’ll build up a larger and larger library of content. The more useful content I have, the more ideas I have for future content and the easier it will be to share things that matter to more people.
Engaging on Social Media
I want to ensure that I’m engaging with my growing follower list on social media.
As I mentioned, I’ve created accounts on other platforms to make sure I’m meeting people interested with my content where they spend their time online. I know a lot of the FIRE community here in Australia uses Facebook, so by increasing my presence there I may be able to increase my reach. Which would be a good thing!
Closing
Overall the metrics show that this was a disappointing month, and a fairly disappointing life update. But overall I’m glad to be back at work and figuring out how to make this part-time work lifestyle work for me.
It’s obvious that balancing everything I want in this first month hasn’t worked out so well. Hopefully this gets easier as I go (and as I stick to my goal of working 4 days a week).
Thank you for reading. If you’d like to read more, check out previous posts on the blog, and follow me on X @ScottOnFire.