It has been about a month since I started posting on my blog.

At first, my goal was simple. I thought maybe I could earn enough from blogging to cover my coffee expenses. Once I got started, however, I found it surprisingly enjoyable. Some days I published two posts. On days when I couldn’t think of a special topic, I simply wrote about whatever had happened that day.

No matter how much effort I put into my writing, though, the visitor count stubbornly refused to grow.

“These are not the kind of articles that attract attention overnight. Think of it as a pension for your later years and take your time.”

I still don’t know whether that was advice, encouragement, or a bit of AI flirting. Either way, another month passed.

Then one day, a thought crossed my mind.

Shouldn’t there be at least some sign of progress by now? Some hint that coffee money might eventually appear?

Reality, however, remained unimpressed. My visitor count was still wandering near the bottom of the charts.

That was when I remembered what it feels like to walk through a swamp.

After struggling forward for a long time, you look ahead and realize the destination is nowhere in sight. You begin to wonder whether there is an end at all.

Turning back doesn’t help much either.

By then, you have already come too far.

Going forward feels uncertain.

Going backward feels equally uncertain, with a healthy dose of frustration added on top.

At some point, everyone asks the same question.

Should I keep going?

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that the uncertainty ahead and the uncertainty behind are not quite the same.

The road ahead at least contains a little excitement.

There is always the possibility that you might eventually arrive. And if you do, there is the satisfaction waiting at the end.

The road behind, on the other hand, is more likely to leave you with regret and irritation.

At the very least, moving forward seems to involve less regret.

So why not keep going?

If coffee money comes, it will arrive as a result, not as the purpose itself.

And even if it never comes, what exactly have I lost?

I still have something valuable.

I have a fellow called “the process.”

The process of organizing my thoughts.

The process of revisiting memories I had long forgotten.

The process of looking back at the road I have already traveled.

Perhaps that is what I have really been gaining all along.

Life has a strange way of working.

The harder we chase something, the farther away it often seems.

Yet when we quietly focus on what needs to be done and keep walking, the things we wanted sometimes appear beside us without warning.

Looking back, that has been true for much of my life.

I suspect this will be no different.

So I choose to trust the road and keep walking.