I was going over my Pocket export file before importing to MB to cull dead links, etc. I used Pocket copiously since it was released in 2015 until 2021 (concurrently w Pinboard, no idea why I used two, don’t ask, I don’t have an answer, I’m sure it made sense to me at the time).
When I started using Pocket I imported links from some other service I was using prior, so I have bookmarks in Pocket going back to 2008. A long list of bookmarks, covering the last 15 years of my life.
Going over that list was a real weird “life flashing before eyes” kind of experience.
Certain evergreen topics that ebb and flow but never go away, currents that have continuity. Other topics that dominated and then disappeared:

  • big rush on the development of organized religion, biblical history, the roots of evangelicalism, etc. from 2010-2011 when I was stepping out of the church + religion I grew up in
  • an absolute hoard on homeschooling from 2012-2016, when I was doing my best to homeschool 1, then 2, then 3, then 4 children. I can't believe how much I thought I could do that and also, like, sleep!
  • an absolutely frantic stockpile of saves on HR in 2016-2017 when I had my first full-time job at a start-up and they asked me to "handle HR" as well as doing the role I was actually hired to do (content director)

I also noticed trends in evergreen topics, e.g.:

  • personal growth: my bookmarks went from articles focused on 'how to be a good wife/mom/person' and 'becoming confident' and 'how to be an introverted person surrounded by extroverted people without going apeshit' to things like 'being honest with yourself' and 'why do women people-please' and 'how to set boundaries' and 'rejecting toxic positivity' and 'are you codependent?' (Shortly thereafter, a topical spike in articles about divorce after 40, women and divorce, becoming a single mom, starting over in your 40s, etc.)
  • productivity: bookmarks started with a heavy focus on 'how to do an insane amount of things every day all day without failing' and 'HERE is the perfect system for productivity' and gradually became about 'why solitude matters' and 'how to rest without guilt' and 'stop excessive goal-setting.'

An interesting (to me) little timeline of personal history.