Pudgy Ponders: "How My Pudgy Penguin Taught Me to Embrace Community Over Ego"

Greetings frens! In this week’s edition of Pudgy Ponders we are going to explore how the Pudgy Penguins taught me to embrace community over ego.

Back in 2011, I wrote a blog focused around me, myself and I. The url was my name and I was the face and voice of the blog and brand. My audience was a combination of online readers and people from my IRL communities. When eventually my blog grew into the thousands of readers a month, I felt a contradiction about what I wanted to do with my life - ie. continue to grow and be the live the public life of a blogger (this was back in 2011, very different from how mainstream blogging is today) - or continue with my career working with early stage startups. I ultimately chose the latter and wonder today if I had approached my blog differently back then, if I’d still be writing it today.

Fast forward to today, I have roughly 5,000 followers on X (shameless ask: and would be forever grateful for a follow!) at the time of writing this post (4/19/25). Whenever I have what feels like a breakthrough big idea thought, I can’t wait to share on X, I can feel the excitement and anticipation building up inside of me. Wait until people see this revolutionary idea I’m going to post, it will only be a matter of time before they realize how much value I am giving them for absolutely FREE. As I hit the “post” button ready to share my “genius” with the world, I’m wondering if the world is even ready for this HUGE idea and sage wisdom I’m about to share.

[waiting, refresh, waiting]….

[run upstairs, get a glass of water, come back to my computer]….

Crickets.

No fireworks.

No viral post.

No likes.

No comments.

Nothing.

Dumbfounded and slightly shamed, I debate deleting the post and instead head outside for a run. On the run, I ponder, what went wrong. Do people not see my realize I charge an arm and a leg for consulting and are giving these ideas away for free? Would I be better off posting as myself instead of my Pudgy Penguin PFP? Did people even see my post? Are the impression metrics on X accurate? Am I being shadow banned? Or maybe I’m just not as smart as I think I am or maybe it was actually a bad idea? Or an idea for the wrong audience? Most of these ideas are centered around my thoughts, my ideas, my feelings, me, me, me. The reality is, despite my ego thinking I’m the center of the world, world doesn’t really care about me.

As I return to my computer slightly dejected, I try my hand at this “posting on X thing” again and this time decide to write a post about $pengu and the Pudgy Penguins. What’s an interesting question can I ask the community I ask myself.

Oh here’s one….

Maybe people will respond this time I tell myself, but then again, maybe not.

I walk down the hall to use the bathroom and come back.

I couldn’t believe my eyes.

14 comments and 34 likes in the first 10 minutes.

Wow.

This one actually hit.

What did I do differently this time?

I made it about community.

About the Pudgy Penguins.

About $pengu

I dropped a post into the energy of 800k $pengu holders.

I proliferated the Penguin.

And instead of crickets, I got insane engagement.

Lesson learned.

X link to post

Thoughts to Ponder: Where else in life is ego getting in the way of success?