| A few years later, I got permanently banned from my Facebook page. They allowed my admins in there but I could no longer interact with readers on social media. That was a huge hit for traffic. Here we go again - too many eggs in that one basket.
Again, the answer was diversification and taking the power into my own hands. I started an email list and began writing to you daily, outside of what we publish on the website.
When Amazon cut our commission again in early 2020 down to 1%, I shrugged and carried on. When I got shadowbanned on Twitter, c'est la vie.
When I got defunded for being a "disinformation" website, it was an enormous hit. Even though I was diversified, it was such a loss of income that it nearly took us down. But because of those other streams and support from you, the readers, we're still moving forward and publishing
daily. We've had to cut back on a lot of expenses, we've had to create new streams of income, but we're still standing.
As we gain ground and begin to recoup what we lost through other sources, we stand to be ahead of where we were before we got defunded. Every single bad thing that has happened has made the business stronger, more resilient, and harder to kill.
This sounds like a business lesson, but it's really a life lesson.
When bad things happen, it's important to feel your feelings and mourn those things. But then you have to dust yourself off and you have to keep moving forward. You have to stop relying on anyone outside your personal network and remember that ultimately, you can only rely upon yourself and those closest to you. You
have to keep building, keep growing, and keep learning.
The more resilient and less dependent you are, the harder you are to kill. You can look at that metaphorically or realistically, based upon your own personal perspective.
Just remember to take some time to keep yourself strong mentally, whatever that looks like for you. For me, it's heading out in the Jeep to take a drive to nowhere, windows down and the radio blasting. For you, it may be a walk in the woods, or going out to your garden. Your mental health is an important factor in making yourself harder to kill. It keeps you strong and helps you to think of solutions instead of getting mired in problems.
I don't know what the future holds for any of us. Just look for the lesson in the hardships to come and build your foundation of resilience from there.
You've got this, my friend.
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