Just today, my website where two of my top earning blogs got penalized by the big G. Zaaap! In a moment.. in a blinking of an eye. Hehe. I wasn’t really shocked though. It was something that I saw coming. I just stared at it straight in the eye until it hit me in the face

Oh well. It has been happening to bloggers exponential in number. I am just one of the statistic . Kidding aside, I have just reaffirmed that life is full of surprises – may it be positive or negative. Some get promoted while some get fired in one day within one company. These things are never going away as long we live. The important thing is (as I said before), these things happen for a purpose and that these things happen to us to make us persons of experience and wisdom. They try to teach lessons. You may find out that hard work pays and the opposite robs. You may learn that procrastinating leaves you cramming which then causes you not to meet an important project deadline which then leads you to packing up things in your big brown box, going home and telling your wife that you lost your job.

I might have not lost a job today but I had my share of life’s down time – a discouragement only if you let it. If there’s one thing I learned today, it’s this: “There are a lot more things that are beyond our control than we know. The best thing that we can control is how we react to these things and situations. Mastering your thoughts and reactions is a huge thing to do, requires mental and emotional hardwork but pays off really big”.

Then comes a time in your life that this self-image we are projecting becomes the very thing that cages us from our potentials. I didn’t realized this until recently.

I grew up through my teenage years and into my adulthood thinking that I am an introvert. True to my thinking, I became one. I don’t go to parties unless I need to. I sometimes dish out invitations to what could have been a nice and fun celebration. Soon, being with a crowed stresses me out. I always looked for excuses not to be there.

When I entered the professional life, that self-image of mine did a huge part in my decision making. I declined offers to jobs that deal mostly with people. I often say “that job is inviting but I’m not that good with people.” Because i say so, then i became so.

Just this morning, I received a text message from a local company to be in their office by 2pm for a job interview. I was delighted to have such opportunity but knowing that the position available is that of a project coordinator, I was having the idea in mind how difficult the job would be for an introvert like me (self-image doing its thing again). I knew that the job would entail me to deal with clients and handle the team doing the projects. I arrived and we went on with the usual interview process. The bottom line, the job didn’t fit me as I always had excuses locking me up in my mind.

Some time during the interview, he asked me if I have any personal messaging account and I answered that I only have one and its with Yahoo Messenger. At the back of my mind, I was asking myself why should I have more than one private messaging account. Thinking that having more than one account for personal messaging is absurd, I was again caging my self to such belief. “Why not?” I ask my self now. “It’s just an account anyway.”

I would like to give credits to the book Follow Your Heart by Andrew Matthews. I am reading it now and I highly recommend it. Just start reading and you’ll know why its a best seller.

The book was subtitled Finding Purpose in Your Life and Work. Andrew mentioned something in it that really struck me. He said “Whoever you are, you aren’t STUCK – you are a human being, not a tree!” He was absolutely right for the situation I was in. I was stuck in something that bore me all because I decided to disconnect with people, for the simple reason that I believe I am an introvert. I was depriving my self of excitement, of discoveries and of learnings that I could never experience when I lock my self out from everybody else.

If there is one lesson I learned today, here it goes: I am a dynamic person very much capable of change and adaptation. My self-image should not be one that’s as stiff as a metal rod, unbending to the changes of time.

Those who adopt, survive. Those who don’t either left frozen in the ice age, left alone in an island during the continental drift or get eaten by predators who have changed well enough to run faster than you.

Lately, I realized that there is a great difficulty in letting go of things that you are accustomed to. Just as a butterfly who earns its strong wings by breaking through the cocoon, so does a person who is able to get out of his or her comfort zone to explore and see things for himself. Money earned is way more fulfilling than money given. Self preservation however is innate and getting out of that thinking requires determination and maturity.

For now, I would have to do with the best way I could with what my hands find to do. Little meaning is given for lives constantly spent on yearning for something not yet achieved for humans would always find something that is lacking, whatever it may be. Plan ahead if you must. Dream for reaching the top of the mountain but don’t forget to smell the flowers and hear the birds singing along the way.

The main difference between the two is that the regular, stand-alone Wordpress (WP) installation

1. Caters for single blogs (which can have multiple users but single administration panel)
2. Its theme can be customized online (using the theme editor)
3. The plug-ins can be edited

while Wordpress Multi-User (WP MU)

1. Is designed to cater from hundreds to thousands of blogs, each with own administration panel.
2. Its theme editor is disabled since one instance of a theme is shared among the users (which means what one gets from a theme is the same to all who uses the same theme)
3. Plugins cannot be edited.

These differences are some of the most obvious in the user side.

Here are points that explain WP MU features further

1. It is created based on WP. It is created as a “shell outside” a regular Wordpress installation. According to their website, 95%- 99% of the core of WP MU is WP.
2. WP MU can have multiple blogs in one installation which means smaller file size for the hosting. Imagine installing fifty (50) blogs using WP on one hosting and WP MU on the other. The savings in terms of size is huge, especially for a website owner.
3. The installation process is different.
4. The panel for the “super administrator” or the site owner can be hidden to regular users, depending on the restrictions.
5. There is a folder named “mu-plugins”. All plug-ins placed inside it are automatically enabled site wide.
6. It still has the folder “plugins” (which is also present in WP). All plugins placed inside it which can be enabled per blog by the specific blog owner (a.k.a. sub-administrator).
7. WP MU requires the site owner (or the web master) to know a bit of programming and coding. If you plan to use WPMU, it is recommended that you tinker with WP first.

Themes that are available online for download are generally working for both installations. The theme management system stayed mainly the same for both installations I guess.

There are issues on installing plug-ins however. Many plug-ins designed for WP do not run on WP MU mainly because there is a difference in accessing and creating tables in the database. Some common plug-ins (like Akismet) can work if this is placed on the “plug-ins” folder and not the “mu plug-ins” folder. A set of plug-ins compatible for Wordpress MU can be found here.

Some of my sites that uses WP MU include this Davao City web community, Tagadabaw.com as well as this online shop, Toinky.com.

To sum it up, if you plan to maintain like 20 to 30 blogs or so or offer a blog hosting (may it be free or for a minimum fee), Wordpress Multi User is for you. You just have to get ready to get your hands dirty with ample amounts of code and a bit of programming or you can hire one who can set it up for you and teach you how to manage it.

If you plan to maintain fewer than 20 blogs (this is a personal preference based on experience by the way), then I recommend the regular stand alone Wordpress installation.

That’s it for now. May the blogging force be with you.

First of all, I do not claim to be a top expert and master in Wordpress. This blog is really about my challenges in doing websites with Wordpress or Wordpress Multi User as the Content Management System used.

I have designed and authored different sites that include Hugsmiles.com which is a free blog hosting site, Toinky.com which is a shopping and lifestyle site, Tagadabaw.com which is a Davao web community based in Davao City, Hugs-u.com which is also a shopping site, Life is a Bowl Full of Cookies which is my personal blog and several others which uses Wordpress or Wordpress MU. But honestly, there is still a lot to learn in this very generous and helpful open-source CMS.

Soon, I will be posting tips on simple topics that many ask about in handling or authoring a wordpress site. Most of these are probably from my own experience so what worked for me should hopefully work for you as long as the basic conditions are met.