It’s been one month since I migrated from WordPress to Hugo. In my original post, I mentioned some of the immediate benefits of migrating: I saved money, performance went up, and I was totally geeking out about getting to learn new skills. It was all about the tech, really. Today, I want to reflect on some of the less obvious benefits and how migrating has had a positive impact on me this past month 😊

I think I can summarize it in one sentence:

I enjoy blogging again because I’ve taken back control of my website.

That sounds a bit strange, doesn’t it? I mean, this has always been my website and I have always been in control of it. But what I’ve realized is that for many years, WordPress and its features and plugins shaped how I used - and didn’t use - my blog.

I can’t and I don’t really blame WordPress. This is mostly about my habits and thought processes and how I started changing them. However, that change only happened because I migrated to a new blogging platform. It was only after I started using Hugo that I realized how I could do things differently.

So what’s different now?

This month’s T-SQL Tuesday is hosted by TJay Belt (@tjaybelt). 2020 and 2021 brought changes for many of us, and TJay wants to know what we have learned, tried, or implemented for balancing work and life during this time. This is an interesting topic for me because I absolutely failed at it in 2020. It was only a few months into 2021 that I started figuring things out for myself. In this post, I will be sharing and explaining the yeps and nopes I have implemented for myself while working from home.

(Side note: After figuring out how to spell dos and don’ts, and deciding that all of the correct options look weird, I chose to use “yeps and nopes” instead. Just… just roll with it 😅)

It’s December 31st, 2019. WHAAAAAT? 🤯 I have no idea how we’re almost in 2020, but here we are! Just a few hours left of the year. (Hi to my friends around the world who are already in 2020! 👋🏻) Like many others, I enjoy reflecting on the year that’s almost over. This year, I’ve decided to collect some of my highlights from 2019.

(Warning! There will be lots of tweets and pictures.)

After spending a week at MVP Summit with old and new friends, I feel energized. My brain has been refilled with lots of happy memories 😊

And one not-so-happy memory:

One. Just one negative experience during an otherwise fantastic week. One negative experience that objectively really wasn’t that big of a deal, followed by an absolutely overwhelming number of replies full of love and support. (Thank you 💙) And yet, this one negative experience has dominated my thoughts and feelings for days.

It’s easy to say that I refuse to let one stranger and one negative experience take over and push my happy memories away. Actually doing it is a whole different situation. No matter how determined I am or how much support I get, dealing with an experience like this is never easy for me.

I have trained my brain for many years to respond in a certain way, to gnaw at the negative even when it’s surrounded by positive. That habit does not change overnight just because I want it to. It’s something I need to actively work on to improve, and that requires determination and effort over time.

Writing is my way of dealing with things like this. Structuring my thoughts, describing my feelings, and reflecting on why I reacted the way I did is all part of my process.

But why are you sharing this publicly?

I’m very aware that my social media accounts are mostly highlight reels. I choose to focus on the positive things in my life, and so what most people see is the happy, bubbly, super excited version of me. I wish life was like that all the time 😊 But it’s not. Most days are not. Some days, you get flat out told that you suck, and instead of being strong and brushing it off, you end up crying and withdrawing from everything and everyone.

And that’s ok. That’s life. We’re flawed, and if we weren’t flawed, we wouldn’t be human. But being human also means we have choices. We can choose to take responsibility for our own feelings, get back up, try to learn from our experiences, and keep going.

Writing helps me. If I can also help someone else by sharing this publicly, whether it is helping one person understand why someone can react strongly to something seemingly small, or showing another person that they’re not alone in experiencing similar feelings, I will count that as a double win 😊

So what happened?

This month’s T-SQL Tuesday is hosted by Andy Leonard (@AndyLeonard). Andy wants to know what is our “why”, or why we do what we do. Before I can answer the why, I will briefly explain the what 😊 I work as a Business Intelligence consultant, focusing on Data Warehousing, Data Integration, and Data Visualization.

The short answer to “why?” is because the work is both challenging and rewarding. As a Business Intelligence consultant, I get to use all my skills from programming to design. I get to satisfy my instinctive need to group, organize, and sort things when working with data. Then I get to make things shiny and pretty. Finally, I get to work with other people, learn about their industries, and help them do their jobs better.

The long answer is… longer 😅 I absolutely love my job now, but I ended up in the world of data completely accidentally. I’ve gone from Web Development to Graphic Design to Interactive Design to Java Programming to SharePoint Development to Data Warehouse Architecture to Community Evangelizing… And now I’m here 🤓 (Phew!) So why am I a Business Intelligence consultant?