Let's kick off this new project

I have a new place on the internet.

After 7 years of experimenting with different blog projects and concepts, when I found myself exhausted, on the border to burnout (caused by a variety of factors) and unable to make myself write anything at all, I decided to stop and think about why I started and whether I wanted to continue.

I’ve written personal blogs in various forms since I discovered blogging in 2008. Really I started blogging because I wanted to share things online, and with a website of your own you can tweak the design and content however you want. At the time I used something called Microsoft Spaces (or perhaps just Spaces) and it was ugly, already then ad-filled, and limited. I already knew some HTML, started learning CSS and after writing on Xanga for a while I finally got myself a website. Many years, blog attempts and domain names later, I now even have a group of people reading what I write, and I want to build something that is sustainable.

I didn’t really start blogging consistently until I started writing about fitness. At the time I wrote about getting into running, but later it has evolved into something different.

Mostly because of events in school, I’ve grown up with a stubborn self-doubt in everything. Then I started strength training in 2022, and things started changing. I still struggle with self-doubt in many areas, but I’ve learned that I’m able to make a positive difference for myself, challenge myself and that I can do things I previously never thought I would be able to do. This has given me a new sense of purpose, and I’ll never look back.

Sharing my story and and my fitness journey gave me a new purpose in writing, and during my recent break from blogging I figured out how I wanted to continue.

The why

Sharing my story and connecting with people. I still want my blog to be a personal blog. I’m not an expert and there are enough people out there giving fitness tips. I want to share my story, hoping people can get inspired from it. More than anything else, the internet today needs more personal stories and people sharing their experiences rather than “here’s a list of fitness hacks”.

After a decade of the blogosphere being overwhelmed of people who blog about blogging or just listicles of the “ultimate list of whatever”, with writing about my fitness journey I discovered there are still real bloggers out there who write about real things. The fitness/running blogger community is lovely and supportive, and whether or not they enjoy reading about my barbell highlights and lowlights, I certainly enjoy reading what they write! Connecting with other people has always been an important reason why I continue writing online.

I want to inspire people. Two years ago I desperately wanted to find a blog like this and it would have helped me tremendously. I was recently diagnosed with osteoporosis and the thought of not lifting weights anymore put me in a state of depression and the feeling that everything is too late, everything good in life is over. I needed to see that there are people with bone density issues who are still kicking a** in the gym and that it’s still possible to build strength, do fun things and live a good life.

Today my osteoporosis has been downgraded to osteopenia, I’ve been able to squat my bodyweight, started exploring the world of hiking and at the time of writing this I’ve started a new heavier program in the gym. There are many ifs and buts around this but generally – lifting weights is good for you ESPECIALLY if you have bone density issues. (Read the disclaimer here)

I want to say that age is just a number and you can still kick ass after 50. This year I’ve had a lot of setbacks with aches and pains here and there and my coach suggested it’s caused by menopause. Nothing bad about my coach, he’s great and he’s probably at least to some extent correct about this and keeps helping me work around the niggles, but it triggered a massive age crisis and again the feeling that I’ve started doing everything good too late. But then I got pissed off, thought about the women I know about who are 50 or even 60+, super strong and still living a good life and kicking a** in the gym. That’s what triggered the idea for the focus of this new blog – defying society’s ideas about what you should and shouldn’t do when you get to a certain age. I want to promote the idea that when you’re over 40 you’re too old to not be lifting weights and making yourself strong.

Sometimes I just want to write about mundane things. I also want to share bits of everyday life, because that’s a fun part of blogging that has been forgotten. I personally love to read about someone’s latest marathon success but also about why they love Christmas teacups. I regularly read comment sections shouting “I miss personal blogs!”, so let’s bring them back.

The how (and where)

Since January this year, I’ve been writing under my personal domain name, with all topics under one roof. That was convenient but became wonky logistically with managing topics, interest groups and all that. I have a group of subscribers from when I was on Substack and they all follow me for my photography. Other people are mostly interested in my fitness topics and some are interested in both. I also share my photography on various apps and I want to share a link to some sort of photography site on my profiles. I felt I needed to do something differently, and also wanted my fitness topics on a more descriptive domain name. While I loved Jävlaranamma as a blog name, I had to accept it’s not great when you write in English for English-speaking readers. (FYI, the Jävlaranamma project lives on. I’ll let you know when I have updates)

So after a lot of brainstorming I got this new domain name for my fitness/personal blog, and put my photography blog on one of my personal domains. Also because now we have a hosting solution that can handle multiple sites much better (big yay).

If you were subscribing to my previous blog, I’ll add you to the appropriate list and you’ll receive e-mails as normal about the topic(s) of your choice.

If you made it to the end of this post, well done! And thanks for being here! I hope to see you in the comment section.