I got a big surprise last night and it has taken me a while to figure out what to do about it.  I've been blogging here for about seven weeks and doing well with the support of a few whales, orcas, dolphins and many minnows & plankton.  But then the rules changed.  @FullTimeGeek decided to delegate 5000 steem to help my cause.  So I spent the last 16 hours trying to figure out how to best honour his generosity and faith in my work.  

I noticed that @FullTimeGeek often tries to encourage people to write more, speak up and engage in conversations.  His support of my work regarding freedom, responsibility, accountability and off-grid living has been exemplary and for that I AM very grateful!  Getting people engaged is where tremendous value is added to the Steem network and is why I am here.  It is the wild west here and an excellent platform to show how self governance can work!  I really think that is why @FullTimeGeek supports the work that I do.  I wanted to find a way to get people engaged in conscious thought regarding matters of freedom and debating the topics to help work through the complexities that we see in our world.

So starting on Sunday I am going to start a Debate Forum sponsored in part by the generosity and support of @FullTimeGeek!  I will pose a question each Sunday and I will then open it up for the week for people to type in their thoughts, research, feelings, opinions or any other expression they feel fits in with the topic being posed.  I encourage people to vote on their favorite responses.  The highest vote from each weekly forum will not only win steem from the support of the people reading and voting, but I will then also gift back the SBD that I received from the post to the individual who got the most votes.  If there is a tie I will break the tie.

By counting the votes rather than the value of the votes, I want to make sure that everyone's votes count the same!  So I will not be evaluating the winner by the value.  Votes count in this debate forum.  Let's see if this helps people get some steem going as I will be casting my vote as well.  You can vote for more than one post as well.  

If anybody has any feedback, tips or suggestions, I would appreciate hearing from you about it.  I would also like some recommendations on tags to ensure we can find a larger audience.  The idea here is to help people who are plankton or minnows grow in influence.  After all, @FullTimeGeek just distributed all his influence to a bunch of people.  It is only fair that I do the same.  That is my intent with this Debate Forum.  I welcome feedback on the idea.  I've never done this before, so I'm green.  

My thoughts about what @FullTimeGeek is doing

It is rare to find people willing to help others.  In the real world, philanthropists would give to charities or hand out grants to help people.  The interesting thing about the concept of delegation is that the steem remains the 'property' of the original owner but is used by the recipient to build their own influence and accumulate cryptocurrency at the same time.  No usury.  No expectations.  In fact, the individual who delegates the steem would experience a drop in capacity to generate more steem, so the gift is very generous.  What is happening is individuals like @FullTimeGeek are doing their best to build a solid platform and the only way we can do that is to help the new users build steem and influence for themselves.  The rich helping the poor!

This is how real life should be as well.  All of us should be reaching out to the poor so that we can help them.  

Give a man a fish, feed him for a day.  Teach him to fish, feed him for a life time.

I work hard to teach people how to be independent.  I don't want to be in a position where we have to give food to people.  I want to have a world where everyone not only knows how to feed themselves, but they have the land, tools, resources, skills, knowledge and experience to do it all for themselves.  What @FullTimeGeek did is to demonstrate his faith in this principle.  He delegated to a bunch of new, inspiring individuals to teach them this lesson.  I was dependent upon @FullTimeGeek and now I must do it for myself.  

For that lesson, I am forever grateful.  I laughed and laughed when I realized this point.  By paying it forward, we can then help others do the same.  I want to honour the lesson by engaging plankton and minnows.  It is my hope that they will benefit from the exchange.  Not only with steem, but also with knowledge and experience that can help them in the physical world so that they can find it within themselves to provide for all their needs.  

Thank you @FullTimeGeek.  It is an honour to use your hard earned steem to pay it forward.  I will do my best to be a proper steward and to bring prosperity to ALL LIFE ON THIS PLANET.  If this is one tool to help me accomplish that goal, that I will do my best to use it!  Much respect to you my dear friend and spiritual brother.