Oct
5
A recent surprise made me re-evaluate what my purpose for this website is.
Around some time last week, a good deal of my pages dropped out of Google’s index. For the non-search engine optimization people, this means that my website is now receiving only a fraction of the traffic that it was before. Usually, when you create a website, search engines such as Google visit your site and index it, making it part of the search engine’s results. Then, when someone goes to Google and type something like “INTJ Personal Development”, they can find my website. This is true for the subpages of the website too - if they are indexed and part of the search engine.
Unfortunately, for some reason or another, Google had determined that about 80% of my articles were “unworthy” of being included in the search results. This proved to be somewhat problematic, as about 75% of my traffic was from Google alone. Therefore, about 50% of my website’s traffic disappeared in about a week’s time. That presented me with somewhat of a dilemma. If my website dropped out of Google, a huge portion of my traffic would be gone, which would severely hinder my ability to reach the people that my articles would have an effect on. Should I abandon the website and let it stagnate? Or should I continue investing my resources of time and energy, knowing that I would be severely hindered?
Clearly, I had a decision to make. This is the type of situation where a clear goal in life helps in making a determination as to the direction to take. As I’ve explained in The Meaning Of Life and How To Find Out What You Really Want, I tend to think people want to exist. Since the purpose of my writing is to provide value to people through increasing their awareness of concepts and possibilities, it would then figure that people would come back on their own if it accomplished that purpose. After all, who wouldn’t want some real value for free?
Additionally, this is also a semi-journal to me, categorizing my life time of experiences. Had there been zero readers, I would probably still write it anyway. Many of my theories, insights, and perspectives are unique as far as I can tell. I am not only writing for my current readers, but also for myself years from now and future readers long after I am dead.
In fact, this had been my original reason for starting the website. I’d known that I may run into problems like this and knew that if my purpose wasn’t sufficiently strong (such as “testing the waters” or “making a small amount of money”), this would be a perfect situation to give up.
This situation has happened to me before. In the early 2000s, I’d started a website about how to play poker well, as I was an avid poker player back then. I very eagerly wrote about 10-15 articles over a weekend and put my website up. A few weeks passed. A month. I didn’t notice any affiliate sales. Then, discouraged, I just gave up. That’s what happens when you don’t have clarity of purpose and sufficiently strong motivation in the first place.
Compare that to a friend of mine who started his poker website at about the same time. He too experienced similar problems, but stuck with it. Now, it’s one of the most successful websites of its kind and makes millions of dollars a year. That’s what happens when your purpose is clear.
Luckily, that experience has stuck with me to guide me in this situation. I started this website for a strong purpose - to allow people to see a unique perpective on life. I had picked a topic I was passionate about - it’s how I think. No matter what happens, this is who I am. One search engine not indexing my website is a small point in time as far as the life of my website is concerned.
Looking back on my doubts, it seems almost ridiculous to worry about some pages not being indexed in a search engine somewhere. It’s kind of like if people gave up a fight for freedom in the U.S. because the French Army wouldn’t help them or something.
Ahead we go! 
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Go ahead! I have your website in my rss feeds so don’t worry & I think other people too.
Maybe it’s only temporary big G deindexing.
I found your site interesting and I hope I’ll find usefull it still.
I came here through Google search so I think it’s fine now.