What Little Fish Say to Each Other.

I had a chance to read and upvote @barrydutton's post yesterday about his general platform observations and his take on how difficult it has been to grow any personal Steem Power on Steemit, in the last 2 months.

If you haven't read it, you can access it here: https://steemit.com/steemit/@barrydutton/a-minnow-speaks-my-open-letter-to-the-steemit-community-the-good-bad-and-the-ugly

About 3 weeks ago, @richardcrill was also brave enough to come forward with his platform observations. Written in a different way, the concepts shared are essential similar, and I upvoted his post also.

If you didn't get to read his blog post, you can read it here: https://steemit.com/steemit/@richardcrill/steemit-is-not-decentralized-and-it-s-causing-a-retention-problem-why-not-give-some-power-to-the-people-that-earn-it-here-s-my

Both are good, very honest posts, written with good intentions and  both from their own hearts. 

What I found equally as important were the comments and community discussions that occurred, as a result of each post. (Do take a minute to read those too, if you are so inclined.)

I can recognize that Steemit as a platform, has some issues. The only constructive thing that I can think to do, immediately, is share the information.

Then, with some further thought, I put some humour around what all of us "little fish" have been thinking and asking each other for the last few months.

I recently took a trip to the Ripley's Aquarium of Canada and I will be posting an article, very shortly about my experiences there. Between @knarly327 and I, we both captured over a 100 photos. I took some of our best shots and am using them to illustrate this funny little narrative. 

If you can relate, I hope you laugh out loud for real!  Here we go, (read this like you would a comic strip):

 Did you see what Nemo ( a.k.a.@barrydutton) has posted? Did you see what Dory (a.k.a. @rebeccaryan) has posted, little girl? 

Don't forget, Steemit is an experiment and the whole world is watching. (It's still in Beta form.)

Remember when we were just little shrimp with reputation scores of 25? We were so green and felt like we were barely able to understand how anything on Steemit worked. We weren't even sure if we'd hang around or not, however we did learn that finger oil tastes pretty good and we started to hang out with the other shrimp.

As time went on, Nemo and Dory grew and so did their reputation scores. They often pooled their intellectual resources with hundreds of other minnows and groups of minnows all helping each other to swim fast in a perpetual circle of taking photos, writing, posting, commenting, upvoting and occasionally re-steeming information with the intent of helping others. Day after day we swam in a circle against a current.

Then, one day, Nemo asked Dory: "Hey Dory have you seen any whales lately? I've been swimming for a really long time in the same circle, working really hard and I haven't seen any." Dory replied, "Come to think of it, I haven't seen a whale in a really long time either. I too have been working hard, everyday swimming in the same circle. I hope nothing bad has happened to them."

(Insert Shower Music from "Psycho" right here.)

(Shudder) "I'm sure nothing bad has happened to them," Dory unconfidently replied. "I think we should just keep swimming in the same circle we have been for the last 3 months."

"Let's try not to get sucked in and dragged to the bottom Nemo", Dory suggested. "I know it's difficult and you often wonder if the hours and hours of circle swimming will ever pay off."

"Just remember that many of our very first "shrimp" friends have grown really big now and in 6 months, have reputation scores over 70!" "That's quite an accomplishment.", Nemo proclaimed.

Some of them, have really big teeth now and have grown a lot of Steem Power muscle.

While, Nemo, Dory and the other smaller fish, try not to let the platform system, swallow them and spit them out like a piece of rubbery broccoli.

Nemo wondered if he should be going it alone. "Would it be a better use of his time and would his quality of life change?", he questioned.

"Only if you develop a really tough shell and you can handle missing the camaraderie you have enjoyed with the new friends that you have made.", said Dory. "Many of us will miss you and the platform will suffer a great loss because you add value and freely help others.", Dory said remorsefully. Wishfully she hoped that none of her Steemian friends would give up, leave the platform and choose to go it alone.

"I think the best strategy for us all is to stick together.

There is strength in numbers. If we can all continue to work together, everyone of us will achieve more.", Dory repeated what Nemo said to her yesterday.

Just keep swimming, even if it feels like it's the same circle everyday. In the end, only 2 things really matter and they are:

1. Your new friends;
2. and if you had fun or not.   

At the end of the day, I hope each and everyone of us continues to enjoy the new friends we have made and that we all make the decision to keep swimming together. No matter what happens with the crypto-currency portion of the platform.  

Continue to swim, little fish. Swim like the wind.

(LOL, I couldn't really think of a fast swimming analogy, so you get wind.)

I welcome your comments and I invite you to follow me on my journey.

Best intentions to all.

~ Rebecca Ryan