It never occurred to me not to vote for myself until a couple of months ago.

Not just my posts, obviously I think my posts deserve a vote or a wouldn't post them.

But my comments - not for the money, but to get them up to the top where people see them.

How did that work? - good, some of my self upvoted comments earned a lot more than some of my posts (and not from me!)

Most people only see the comments up at the top so self voting achieves that.

Why did I stop? - because a whale I respect highly pretty much told me to. Occasionally when it's important I still upvote my own comments. And all my posts always, or course!