NOT GOOD ENOUGH

Well, it's been two days since I wrote anything on here. I have failed to keep my pledge which is to give @haejin something to flag and also using these writing sections as a means of catharsis. It's true the flags have a psychological effect on me as the upvote do but i think i am a bit resilient. It is unfortunate that the name 'haejin' has cast a dark shadow that has been following my steem journey for the past a month now. Maybe this is becoming an unpleasant addiction--i mean not wanting to miss any chance to call him 'stupid' and not only because I want to but also because I think it is true. He is a stupid old man with alot of power (i know alot of those in my country). But today isnt about haejin. So let's go into today's discussion.

Okay, I will admit, I miss making money (on this account). There is this sense of fulfillment that comes with creating something and getting rewarding for it. That's my fix. Before I discovered steem it used to be feedbacks--comments. When I write something and I receive a good comment I get my fix. It was the drug that fueled my creativity. I wanted to write something that meant something to someone, that hasn't been the case for over year now. Making money for adding no value to anyone is very addictive. Even though there is some effort put into the creative process it still feels like a steal. Fortunately, I have been able to take that off my conscious and told myself I deserved to be paid for my effort because it was good.

Yesterday in church I heard a very interesting story. So there was this minister of God, he finished top of his class in Bible school. Had a very powerful minister of God as a father, who was very popular in the United State. At some point, he wanted to start his own ministry. He didn't want to live in his father's shadows so he decided to branch out. In his mind, he thought he had what it took, a good track record and brilliant ideas he was going to implement in his own church. So he sent out his résumé to big churches in America. None called him back. So he decided to take it a notch lower by sending his résumé to medium churches which he felt would definitely pick him giving his pedigree and value he was going to add to their church. None reached out to him either. To cut the long story short he ended up servicing in a very small church. The remarkable thing about the whole story was that all his said brilliant plans and ideas he had did not work in building this said small church. So clearly he was overestimating himself and his abilities. It actually took the idea of an old lady in the church to move his ministry forward. There are many lessons to be learnt here. One of which is the delusion of grandeur. Two days ago some unknown entity was in my comment section telling how skilled and purposely known he is within the blogging sphere. But the question is, how has this helped steem? Many of us are quick to talk about our accomplishments outside steem, or our connections but we've not translated these experiences or skills to make steem a better Blockchain. All we do regurgitate the same idea that steem will change the world and its potentials, all of which are still theories.

One of the things the story abovr has done is that it has humbled me. I might be good at what I do but that doesn't mean I have sold or pitched my ideas and skills well. There are a few persons here I feel are good at what they do, but at the same time, I feel they won't make a penny elsewhere. So in a nutshell earning on steem is still very much a gift. Everyone wants/likes receiving gifts even when they don't merit it.

Steem as an imperfect thing

I'm currently reading Edward Snowden's book, permanent record. I love the way he spoke about hacking. One of the things I picked is how people create systems and rules without testing them, most of which are geared towards protecting the people who make them. In the process of doing so, they fail to explore the loopholes that are inherent therein, within their systems. And many of us have explored those loopholes, in other words, hacked the system, to suit our own agenda. Your hack might be posting every day because that's the only way you can get what you want from the system or exploring or building relationships. These things are not frowned upon here, whereas in public domain, getting rewards based on your relationships might be discouraged because it leads to favoritism which generally doesn't promote the best. Same with spewing out content on a daily basis, asides sounding redundant, the law of diminishing return sets in. But in hindsight, this is merely just a game and we all are pursuing selfish interest at the detriment of the platform itself.

Does the Blockchain have enough to sustain its 7,000 active users?

Well, it does. The steem blockchain has enough to cater to everyone based on their contribution but that has not been the case. While some feel they deserve more based on their stake, others feel they deserve more based on their contribution in terms of content. This is the debate most of us had against platforms like Facebook, who provided the infrastructure (spent the money) and were taking all the gains while we provided the content. Now the steem blockchain and its stakeholder promises to give you some of that pie. Now it's a case of it not being enough but we have to deal with it because those who make the rules say so which leaves us with no other option than to find our hack. For a guy like haejin, it is upvoting shitposts and taking a chunk of the curation reward. While for a guy like me it's cussing people like him and hoping people like you support me.

The beautiful and confusing thing about steem is that there are no laid down rules actually. People make them up as they go and depending on their influence here it becomes a norm. Memes are big things on other social platforms, here it is frowned upon. Like I said it is quite blatantly that's why almost everything you do here seems like a hack.

What's my role as a steemian?

Asides making money from content, I think it's important that I speak the truth--my truth. I don't know if you've noticed but a lot of lying, dreaming and wishful thinking going on here. Those who even make an attempt to say their truth come of as anti-steem, and to be frank most of them are just blatantly rude. I don't care about whatever you have to say, if you cannot be civil then it isn't worth my time, period.

I know in the process of saying my truth I can be wrong (which is a rarity) and I am not too stuck-up to admit that. Like if you had asked me a couple of months ago I would have told you I'm amongst the top bloggers here and deserve all I have gotten or taken from the platform. I remember someone accused me of not being a diehard steemian because I was powering down and I was upset. Now, I don't even have an opinion of my ability. I think the problem I have now is with haejin. Even in comparison he has taken more from me than I did from him and has abused his position as a major stakeholder here. I want to come for his reputation but the man is basically faceless. And other times, I feel like it isn't worth it. I can start afresh and still rise to the top, it is something I have done before. The only difference now is that I don't feel like it is worth it.