Haywire Infrastructure Move

I decided to relocate our digital infrastructure a few months ago, in early September. Along with a few other online endeavors I’ve nurtured over the years, this site, HK – Mindset Matters, has been doing well. It was practical, hands-off, and dependable enough for my needs, but it was no longer adequate given the span of work everyone is involved in. Thus, I ended up in the midst of moving the complete infrastructure, including self-hosted servers and unique configurations- to a new configuration. No team, no outsourced help – just me, diving into the technical trenches.

What began as a simple plan rapidly turned into chaos. And let me tell you, it put all of the mindset ideas I’ve written about here to the test. Today, I want to draw back the veil on that event. Not only the details of what went wrong, but also deeper comments on resilience, patience, and why accepting the mess is often the best way to growth. If you’ve ever had a project go horribly wrong, this is for you. It serves as a reminder that, even in the digital arena, where everything appears intangible, the human element, our mindset, determines the outcome.

Let’s get back to the why. For years, I’ve highlighted in writings like “Money Is Not The Goal” that true riches originate from autonomy and purpose, rather than financial measures. Applying that to my online world, I recognized that relying on third-party suppliers meant I was at their dependence for upgrades, outages, and even content policies, despite the fact that the sites were hosted on dedicated servers. I desired greater autonomy, faster load speeds, better control, and the ability to change things without having to go through hoops and headaches of server management. So, I methodically planned it out. The checklist was thorough, including database backups, FTP file transfers, DNS adjustments, and SSL certificates. I set aside a weekend for it, thinking, “How hard could this be?” I’ve experimented with this technology several times previously.”

Oh, how naive. The first hiccup occurred during database export. What should have been a clean dump became a corrupted file due to incompatible character encodings hidden in old posts. Hours were spent diagnosing that alone. Then what? Importing to the new server? Permission issues galore. Files that had previously uploaded successfully vanished, and phantom errors appeared in the logs. By day two, the site had gone live on the new host, but it was broken. Links resulted in 404 errors, stylesheets failed to load, and, worst of all, a large number of media files (the images that bring my words to life) were either missing or displayed as broken placeholders. Backup, backup, backup. They never seem to work well.

Frustration set in, but I remembered what I wrote in “Exploring the Mighty Mind”: Our thoughts shape our reality. Instead of becoming frustrated, I paused. Breathed. Reframed it as a puzzle rather than a catastrophe. Nonetheless, things escalated. The email server that serves multiple domains malfunctioned, causing messages to bounce. But that’s how things were. What about the analytics? They tanked during the outage, reminding me how intertwined everything is in this online ecosystem.

In the midst of it, a few things went terribly wrong. One particularly memorable blunder was the permalink structure. The old host’s URLs were attractive and SEO-friendly. After migration, they reverted to query strings, which are ugly, unoptimized messes that can harm search rankings. Another issue: the theme I’d been working on and customizing over time didn’t work well with the new PHP version. Widgets vanished, and sidebars collapsed. It felt like rebuilding a house after a storm, brick by brick. But so it was. You’re always learning something.

But here’s the silver lining – and the fundamental mindset shift I want to emphasize. Despite the chaos, the majority of my posts remained intact. All of those purpose-driven reflections, such as “Is Your Life A Journey?” are still available and ready to inspire. Sure, some images need to be swapped or added – I have placeholders where visuals once amplified the message – and a few entries could use some retouching to improve flow. But that’s fine. Perfection is not the goal; progress is. I’ll tackle them gradually, post by post, as time permits. It’s not about rushing to fix everything at once; it’s about consistent effort, in accordance with the principles I outlined in “There Is Only One Thing You Need To Be Happy.” – finding contentment in the process, not just the end result.

I’ve been quieter than usual because the last few months have been a whirlwind of activity. My plate has overflowed with the current project I’m working on with laser focus (echoing themes from my career advice pieces), family commitments that keep me grounded in what’s truly important, and navigating unexpected health changes for loved ones. I could have hired help or asked the team for assistance with the migration, but I chose to do it myself. It forced me to face discomfort and apply the mindset tools I’ve shared here in real time. When servers crashed at 2 a.m., I didn’t curse the technology; instead, I wrote in my journal about being grateful for the opportunity to learn.

This experience reinforced an important truth: change, particularly self-initiated change, rarely goes as planned. But that is where growth hides. We develop resilience during the times when everything goes wrong. Consider this: how many times have you avoided a major shift due to potential pitfalls? Whether it’s changing jobs, relocating, or, like me, overhauling your digital infrastructure, the fear of failure can be paralyzing. However, as I reflected on those lengthy “figure it out” sessions, it is the mishaps that teach us. I learned more about server administration in one week than I had in years of casual reading and playing. More importantly, it deepened my empathy for others going through transitions. In “When Customers Need Help,” I talked about stepping into someone’s shoes; this migration let me walk in my own, stumbling and all.

If you’re reading this and thinking about making a change, whether personal or professional, take heart. Prepare thoroughly, but expect the unexpected. Prepare yourself with patience, a growth mindset, and possibly a backup of your backups. For me, the site is now stable, faster, and overall not bad. What about the retouching? It’s an ongoing mindfulness practice that I’ll incorporate into quieter days. What about the busyness? It’s easing up, making way for new posts like this one, in which I can share unfiltered lessons.

Finally, this was more than just moving bits and bytes. It exemplified mindset in action. Chaos is not the enemy; it is the forge. Embrace it, learn from it, and come out stronger. What’s your next major move? Whatever it is, keep in mind that the journey, whether haywire or not, shapes who you become.

Mindset First. Keep Thriving!