If you have been here for at least a month are starting to realize that "getting paid to blog" isn't realistic.

I love Steemit but lets get real for a minute

Since stumbling upon Steemit I've been nothing but impressed. The idea of free money is enough to enthrall anyone that needs to eat in this world. Though there's this one thing that continues to irk me, and I myself am guilty of doing it.

Spreading the hype of getting paid to blog.

Sure, you may get paid. Maybe. You may not. And yet, there's this misconception that's being spread that you're guaranteed a payout every time you post and so, we each spend hours and hours on end hoping to create some piece that is unfathomable to consider as anything less than likable and then we post it expecting to generate the same amount of income that the last trendy post we created did. If you've truly been paying attention then you too know this is true.

I may be treading on thin ice by writing this post but I don't care. Fuck it. It needs to be said. We each need to get a grip on reality. Posting on Steemit is obviously more beneficial than posting anywhere else because of the fact that free money is being thrown around but come on, where did it say you will get paid for blogging. Get real.

It's time to start spreading this sentiment instead of the prior. That Steemit, for the time being, is more likely a lucky dip than it is a career opportunity. There is no guarantee that you will get paid nor is there a guarantee that you will be generating a steady income. You can't survive off of Steemit. Well, not unless you're famous and therefore attractive to every curator that's working hard to promote the platform...

I remember a post I saw when I first started here. It was a series of posts from a user by the name of @ma3. He proposed that he would start living off of only Steemit rewards for the next month. He floated the idea first and received a pretty good response. His very first post generated a nifty sum of $550, however, the next day he only made $3. From then on he did not make much more than that.

Now, if you check his account you'll see that he hasn't posted for a month. If I had to speculate a "where is he now" I'd say he's probably been cut off from the internet and is now living under a bridge somewhere. No offence to the champ, even I believed the idea of living off of Steemit was the dream, but it turns out it's just a dream and nothing else.

On the other hand...

If you're attractive to the marketing strategy these powerful curators are abiding by or you already have a massive following, then you may just be scraping enough to quit your day job. Even then I still wouldn't recommend it. If you've ever tried to predict the future then you've probably realized pretty quickly how wrong you can be. As an investor I like to think of life being as volatile as a stock or business. The same applies here to Steemit. Even if you were successful on here one day, there's absolutely no guarantee that you will be just as successful the next. I myself thought this initially after my first three posts were in the hundreds (safe to say my mind was blown none the less) but I was quickly brought back down to earth within my next series of posts. This can happen to the best of us. You win some, you lose some, but here you need to be lucky.

Of course there's no harm in making a really good post. Obviously, if a curator likes your post it's probably because it's a good thought out piece of writing that has some benefit to the curator and others. The fact is however that there's not enough curators floating around to give out the amounts of wealth that we're all expecting. Those of you who have failed to see this really need to adjust your seat and read that again. There is not enough curators to disperse an equal amount of wealth across all the posts that are being created. A good example of this is when you watch @roelandp's Steem stream. You can see just how many posts are being created; thousands.

There are literally thousands of posts being created per day and yet there are only 50 curators who can give you the hundred dollar reward that you're expecting. Not to mention you're competing for that reward against 75,000 other users, 5000 - 15000 of which are persistently active.

On top of that, you also have to compete with the fact that everyone is now creating their own little curation groups. I myself have been guilty of joining curation groups, and why wouldn't I. I've realized that if I want 100 likes on my posts now, then I have to do what everyone else is doing. Hell, I just cracked 100 followers. 30 of which came from the last week because I've been heavily promoting my posts within the community. What? Did you really think it was all just guaranteed. No way José. All of these things are reasons why you're probably not going to get the pay out you're expecting.

Now, Steemit wasn't always this way and it most likely wont remain this way for long... but we really do need to remember that for now you're not getting paid to blog;. You're possibly getting a donation for posting on a Social Media platform and that's it.
Imagine this, if I were to post on Facebook and some millionaire came along and decided, "hey guy, I like what you said. Here, have some of the interest I earned on my investments this month". Of course that's never going to happen in the mainstream but it's analytically what's happening here. We need to remember that when we post.

I'm not knocking Steemit, nor have I ever lost faith in the platform. For me this place has become second nature. I wake up in the morning, grab a coffee or four, and start checking my account and news feeds. I've come to the conclusion that I honestly don't care about getting paid on here anymore. If I do then fuck yeah, if I don't then meh, at least I didn't waste my time trolling around on some other shitty Social media website filled with ego complexes and enslaved-like mentalities.

What I am saying here is that we need to come back down from cloud nine and remember Steemit is what it is. If you can sustain an income from here than so be it, but don't go running around telling everyone else they can achieve the exact same thing. Shit, I did that and now I feel like a cock when people tell me they made absolutely nothing from posting. Don't be a cock like me. Be smart.

If you really want to make money here, then invest in the platform. The interest rates on this site are awesome, not to mention the fact that the share price is extremely undervalued due to Synereo and its advertising schemes. If you have the time you can invest that time instead, build a following like I have, and hope for the best. But again, you're not getting paid, you're getting donations.

Peace.

Sensei Teekay Out!
*mic drop*