My name is Kay. I was born in 1990, and I am the brain behind this entire operation that I called Thoughts of Mayhem.
I have been a storyteller for as long as I can remember. I even went to college to study journalism, fully intending to make a living out of stringing words together.
But somewhere along the line, my career took a completely different turn.
I still write for a living today, but the mechanics are entirely different.
Instead of telling the stories I actually want to tell, my day job requires me to manufacture the best possible narrative for things other people need me to sell. Do not get me wrong, I am highly effective at it. If I was not, I would not have the financial freedom or the free time to sit here and type out these exact words for zero pay. Yet, there is a lingering frustration that gnaws at me every time I close my laptop.
It begs an obvious question.
If I love writing this much, why does it bother me when the view count stays at a hundred? The logical assumption is that we should pursue our passions regardless of the applause or the paycheck.
That sounds fantastic in theory, but in reality, it is much more complicated.
Escaping the Trap of a Result-Oriented Mindset
To really understand how I got here, you have to look at my background.
Before (and during) I became a trained journalist, I was a competitive athlete.
I competed in a niche sport, but it demanded absolute dedication and relentless training. I pushed myself to the limit and eventually ranked among the top eight players in the country, for this even making it onto the senior national team.
That level of competition fundamentally wires your brain to seek out measurable success. I defined myself as an athlete.
But then I stopped. Being an athlete. At least in that sport I claim to be so good at.
After that I was at the Ironman World Championchips in Kona during my year abroad.
I did two 70.3 Ironman myself only to see that I rank 987 out of 2.200 participants.
Sure. Everyone and their mother says: „Crazy, finishing a 70.3 Ironman. Very few people can pull that off.“ And yet, I only see the ones who are better than me.
For the longest time, I projected that exact result-oriented metric onto every single aspect of my life. I still catch myself doing it today (every. single. fucking. day.). I would discover a new hobby, get wildly obsessed, and then pursue it purely to hit a specific milestone.
I wanted the validation.
I wanted to show the world exactly how capable I was.
Everything became a performance, and the joy of the activity itself was completely secondary to the applause at the finish line.
That competitive drive bled directly into my writing. I tried to commercialize my personal projects and twist them into something that could generate income or massive traffic. Despite all the false starts and the commercial failures, the one thing I never did was stop typing. Commercial writing demands a rigid structure and a focus on audience retention, but deep down, I was slowly learning how to write simply to write. You can still harbor a deep desire for people to read your work while maintaining an unconditional love for the process itself, completely independent of your actual reach.
Unlearning the Hustle and Finding the Core
Lately, I have been spending a lot of time studying Buddhism. That philosophical shift is exactly what sparked this internal debate. The teachings emphasize that you do not have to choose between creating purely in a vacuum or selling out for maximum exposure. I have already proven to myself that I will continue to write even when the analytics dashboard shows a flat line.
If you opened my closet right now, you would find stacks of notebooks filled to the brim with ideas, character sketches, and stories that even I have completely forgotten about.
But it still feels strange when only two people open my newsletter. It is definitely not the grand vision you have in your head when you turn your childhood passion into a university degree.
I am simply not the type of person who does something aimlessly. You do not spend hours in the kitchen meticulously preparing a massive meal just to throw it directly into the garbage.
So now I sit here, confident that I have found the exact right words, and simultaneously annoyed that too few people will actually read them.
But that annoyance did not stop me from publishing them anyway.
Does that mean the act of writing stands above everything else?
Did I train for an Ironman just so I could talk about it later?
Am I learning chess right now just to document the learning curve?
Am I reading books on Buddhism just to share my epiphanies online?
The honest answer is yes. (Not entirely, but yes.)
And the more words I put on this screen, the more comfortable I become with that reality.
Building a Platform for Unfiltered Mayhem
This website exists so I finally have a place to write about the things I do, simply so I can write about them.
I am done starting a brand new, highly-niched blog every time I pick up a new interest. Everything is going to live right here in one centralized location. This is my magazine. My… Notebook of some sorts?
Better yet, it is our platform.
I might publish a deeply researched, long-form journalistic piece one week, and then finally post those short stories I have been hoarding the next.
I am going to write about indoor gardening with my friends.
I am going to let my alter ego write aggressive book reviews.
And so could you. Here. With me.
I want to build a platform where the writing reaches the people who actually want to engage with it. There is a real freedom in abandoning the algorithm. It would be completely pointless to go into a hardcore Triathlon subreddit and try to explain that I gave up reading Dungeon Crawler Carl at book five. I am only talking to the people who want to listen.
For the first time in my digital life, the goal is no longer about forcing an audience to consume my content. It is simply about letting the right people find it naturally.
The Final Mayhem
Yes, there is a clear irony here.
I am sitting here talking about writing for the pure joy of it, while actively cross-posting these links on Bluesky and Reddit. But that is the balance I am trying to strike. It would be incredible if the entire world read this site and I no longer felt like I was screaming into the abyss.
But if the audience stays small, that is fine too.
The initial spark for every single post on this site is the raw fun of creating it.
It is only after the text is finished that I realize I created something cool and want to share it.
People always ask if you would still do what you do if no one was watching.
For my writing, the answer is a frustrating, undeniable yes.
And because I put in the work in the dark, I have earned the right to try and drag it into the light. If there is anyone else out there who feels the exact same way and wants a quiet corner of the internet to put their own thoughts on paper, reach out to me. The door is always open.
