Excited By Life is back — a quieter journal for living awake

I used to treat this site like a stage. Hundreds of posts. Challenges. Book notes. Health experiments. Then life got louder than the publishing schedule — illness, recovery, family, work — and the archive went quiet.

I’m bringing Excited By Life back. Not as a content machine. As a journal.

What this version is for

I write when I have tried something on myself and found a high-leverage 5% worth handing over. Right now that means:

1. Theravāda practice — sitting, sīla, and noticing what actually changes behaviour rather than what sounds wise.
2. Learning Pāli — slowly, imperfectly, because the language of the early texts keeps sharpening how I hear ordinary English advice.
3. Health and fitness — the boring consistency that outruns motivation.
4. Journaling — as a tool, not a performance.
5. AI as a personal-development coach — useful when it asks better questions than it answers; rubbish when it flatters.

Technical systems writing lives at ftmon.org. This site is the other ledger: how to stay awake inside a human life.

What I am not doing

I am not dumping the old WordPress archive onto the homepage. The Wayback copies can wait for a careful pass. Fresh relaunch means fresh attention.

If a post from the past still earns its keep, it can come back later — edited, dated honestly, and linked to what I believe now.

My next action

Keep a short weekly note: one practice, one body check-in, one question I am sitting with. Publish when the note has a clear gift for a reader — not when the calendar says I “should”.

Your turn

What are you practising quietly that never makes it into your public feed? If you want, steal the weekly note structure above and tell me what shows up.