I’ve been blogging here for over five years, and now I find myself somewhat tired of it. It used to be fun and helped me take my mind off things, but now I feel like it’s becoming a burden.

It’s the last place I’m online, the last place I regularly update, and the only place I share my ideas. However, I have a strange feeling about it—a sense of disappointment and discouragement.

I feel like I have nothing valuable to share with others anymore. It seems pointless to share my political views, ideological beliefs, and understanding of the world. Apart from free software, I don’t think there’s anything anyone would find useful to read here. I’m empty of new ideas, tired of sharing them, and too busy to curate any meaningful writing.

I’ve thought hard about deleting this blog. I did it some time ago, but I later regretted my decision and brought it back. Now, I’m considering purging everything again. I’m even thinking about removing the DNS records so that there would be no web page, not even an error page. However, I know I’ll miss it. I find something interesting to share, and I regret that I don’t have a place to put it. I’ll have something to say, and I’ll feel sorry that I purged the only place I could say it freely.

I know it’s my safe haven, and I mostly write for myself rather than for readers. I don’t try to attract people; my goal is to express my thoughts and feelings freely. I’ve thought about deleting this blog, it’s been on my mind for a long time, and I find it too difficult. Mostly because I feel a sense of security and belonging here. I feel there’s somewhere I can talk when there’s nowhere else. I think I can be useful, I can teach something and learn more from others.

I’ve found friends through this blog and I intend to find more. I’ve learned a lot from them and I enjoy their messages now and then. So I’ll keep it alive for another day. Tomorrow, I hope to decide to keep it for one more.

I’ve experienced this a lot. Sometimes the most complicated problems we face in life, ones that mostly we created for ourselves, have the simplest solutions to fix. Sometimes we just don’t see it. Sometimes it’s so obvious we just can’t believe the problem we thought was so big, is just a small little inconvenience we can fix with littlest effort.

I was thinking about this huge problem I had in my digital life for some time and talking to a friend about it and it then hit me. Do this small effortless fix and everything will get back to normal. No need to bother myself or anyone else. This actually happened a lot and some of them were so trivial that I don’t even believe if the actual problem was that ridiculous.

Sometimes we just got to take a deep breath and just not to think about it.

You can return to the past, but the past is empty. Your old school is still operating, but your friends and classmates are no longer there. Your childhood home is still standing, but your family is gone, and when you walk down the alley, your neighbors and childhood playmates are no longer around.

The cafe you used to love still exists, but your favorite barista, who knew your order, has moved on. The streets remain the same, but the faces do not. The buildings are still the same, but the energy and feeling you once got from them have changed.

The past is a place, but the present is where life flows. It’s sad but you got to move on. I try to think about the past with a smile. I try to remember my memories and enjoy the good feeling I got in that second, instead of feeling down for not being able to enjoy that exact moment.

There’s a paragraph on my web site, on all my personal web sites that I ever have published, that I truly believe in.

One of the benefits of having an open mind is that one’s thoughts and opinions will eventually change. There is no shame at all in changing personal views and beliefs over newly presented evidence.

I really believe in that and I experience this on a daily basis. There’s not a single day that passes and I don’t think about how I’ve been growing up and changing my ideas, belief, and my way of thinking. Every day, I think to myself about how silly I was just a year ago.

I used to think I’m a communist/anarchist. I believed in that system and I promoted it. There’s no doubt that communism is pretty in theory and I loved that theory but I grew up to realize how dangerous it is. How practically it creates dictatorships. It’s been long since I admired a communist.

I remember how in my teen years I used to love Che Guevara. Who wouldn’t love that lovely man on poster? Now I resent that racist, bigoted, mass murderer.

I used to love BMWs, now, as an adult, I love Benz.

I came to realization that growing up has a real impact on you. Age is not just a number, it really matters sometimes. It shows off your experiences and maturity. It shows you how much you’ve changed over time and how much you’re more understanding and thoughtful. I’m pretty sure in some years, I’m totally different from now as I grow up and gain more experiences and become more mature. And it has no shame in it.

I’m only one step away from deleting this blog and it’s so easy for me. I have no attachment to it. I no longer see any purpose to sharing what I think about stuff and I’m certain absolutely nobody cares what I think or experience.

Not that it’s bad. I don’t mean nobody cares so it’s bad, I mean nobody cares as nobody shouldn’t care. Why someone would care at all if I experience some inconveniences or liked something or have some comments on a post someone wrote? If I deleted this blog now, nothing in world would change.

And again, I’m not saying this out of sadness or anything, it’s just a fact. Nothing is special about this blog, I’m just a little human in an infinite universe writing words some other humans can understand. Is it necessary to have a blog or write about stuff or share your ideas? Absolutely not.

However, this blog has something special for me that prevents me from deleting it. That one step away from deleting it is that it made me some amazing friends along the way that I probably couldn’t enjoy their friendship if I wasn’t publishing it. I have the pleasure of talking and communicating with some awesome people because of this blog.

We usually comment on each other posts via email (and other messaging tools) and share our ideas about various topics. I realized I have so much in common with my friends and it’s so satisfactory. I could delete this blog right now. It’s few click away from a static empty page and nobody would get hurt. I would even save time and energy by deleting it but I’m still tempted to make more friends, have more conversations about topics me and my friends are interested in, and have the courtesy of experiencing these joyous human relationships I have.

So again, is it necessary to have a blog or write about various matters? No. Does anyone need it? No. Do I want it? Heck yeah.

Recently, instead of using entrepreneur as a bio, I tend to introduce myself as an engineer. This is because my main job right now isn’t my business, rather is an engineering position in a company. But I was thinking to myself, am I an engineer because I’m practicing it or because I hold a degree?

So if someone has an engineering academic degree but practices medicine or philosophy or maybe is a salesman, is that person still an engineer or not? I’ve been called an engineer even when I was not working an engineering job, so I think people really don’t care about the title, as opposed to doctors who I think really care, but the question remains, is someone with an engineering degree who doesn’t practice, still entitled to be called an engineer?

I know in some places you should get a special license to practice or be called an engineer, and I think it makes sense somehow, but in general, what should we do? Should we call people with an engineering degree (who don’t practice it) an engineer? What about those with experience and those who practice an engineering job but don’t have a related academic degree?

I personally think we should call both engineers. Wikipedia calls engineers “professionals who invent, design, analyze, build and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets, and materials to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while considering the limitations imposed by practicality, regulation, safety and cost.” So I think it’s that simple, one who fits in this description is an engineer.

In 1961, the Conference of Engineering Societies of Western Europe and the United States of America defined “professional engineer” as follows:

A professional engineer is competent by virtue of his/her fundamental education and training to apply the scientific method and outlook to the analysis and solution of engineering problems. He/she is able to assume personal responsibility for the development and application of engineering science and knowledge, notably in research, design, construction, manufacturing, superintending, managing, and in the education of the engineer. His/her work is predominantly intellectual and varied and not of a routine mental or physical character. It requires the exercise of original thought and judgment and the ability to supervise the technical and administrative work of others. His/her education will have been such as to make him/her capable of closely and continuously following progress in his/her branch of engineering science by consulting newly published works on a worldwide basis, assimilating such information, and applying it independently. He/she is thus placed in a position to make contributions to the development of engineering science or its applications. His/her education and training will have been such that he/she will have acquired a broad and general appreciation of the engineering sciences as well as thorough insight into the special features of his/her own branch. In due time he/she will be able to give authoritative technical advice and assume responsibility for the direction of important tasks in his/her branch.

(source)

I wonder what majority of people think? And is there such confusion or disagreement in other titles and fields?