Hey again, Steemitzens
Have you forgotten about Facebook and Twitter?
Gosh, I've been so busy since I got involved in the Minnow Support Project and P.A.L. Network community here on Steemit and on the PAL/MSP discord chat channels. I've nearly forgotten about my prior lives on Facebook and Twitter among others. I have to remind myself those even exist now and force myself to go back and tell my friends and family I am still alive. It shocks me how difficult it is to convince them to come join us here, in this pioneering brave, new world at steemit on the steem block chain. It's frustrating when I show them information like I will include later in this post and they still simply don't see the truth through the cloud of their zuckerberg-feeding misconceptions. Even as I try to tell them all of the following about the place...
Let's get real though!
Lately a dear, sweet friend of mine whom I totally admire and respect, and I, have been discussing the way that steemit works in general. Things like communities and personalities and motives and ways that people could benefit from the system, but also, in the jaded, tired voices of those who have spent time deep in the battles of daily life on this battlefield for attention, we speak warily of folks with less than altruistic intentions. We talk of gaming, and bots and circle jerking and self promotion for both healthy and unhealthy purposes. We discuss deep seating feelings of dread about some of the behaviors we notice in others around us, and we discuss how it coulda, shoulda, woulda been if only if.
These discussions have really gotten me thinking about my own behavior quite a bit. I came in with lots of experience in social networks. I directed a company for years that spent millions building a gen 2.0 social network myself, and I've been online with the world via modem or internet since the mid 1980s. This was not my first rodeo and I came in like a wrecking ball. I played by the battlefield's rules and I was a rising star here in no time, climbing the various ranks on steemwhales.com like I was just jogging to the moon. Maybe not on the money totals, but in all other community respects, I sort of overnight sensation-ed.
In two months here, I've built a following of over 900 new friends, all organically without ever directly asking for a follow and posted almost 3200 blogs and comments along the way. I've built a Radio Station that now streams globally worldwide 24 hours a day, and features 14 scheduled two hour live audience shows with 22 DJs signed up and either already premiering new shows or soon to be on the schedule. Be sure to check out the full schedule of news, talk, popular commercial music and more at http://mspwaves.com to learn more about the station and our wide variety of awesome hosts, hostesses and their shows.
I was awarded an MSP Medal Of Honor for my contributions to that community of fine folks (thanks @aggroed and MSP peeps!), I was interviewed two times by other steemitizens for their blogs ( @jassennessaj and @samest, thank you! ), and I was mentioned in over 25 blog articles by other people who thought enough of me and our shared experiences here to mention me in kind ways. (Search em, 25+peeps would take forever to find and tag!)
I am humbled and honored and flattered by all the attention, and it is definitely part of the addiction that this place, and the excited, passionate, smart early adopting folks here all feed to make me keep coming back. Ever optimistic that this block chain has a very long future ahead for all of us.
But even while I am staying busy, sleepless and poorly fed for 20 and 30 hour runs between hours in discord, live DJ sessions spanning 2-12 hours at a time and infrequent short naps, I still feel like I haven't posted anything of value in forever. It really seems sometimes like all I do now is work on the MSP WAVES RADIO NETWORK project and hang out in our chat rooms, generally causing a ruckus while helping new DJs and new minnows in MSP onboard into our groups, and people find the answers to their questions, and sometimes melting down in sheer excitement, passion, frustration, and exhaustion along the way.
But hey, we're family in MSP and I'd like to think I can be forgiven when I fall apart, given how much time I otherwise spend there trying to achieve good things that can help us all succeed in our steemit endeavors and goals.
So I got to thinking, after all this recent discussion with my friend about steemit user behaviors and all this introspection I've summarized for you above about my own behaviors, and I keep arriving at the same simple thoughts.
I am my own worst enemy. I am everything self promotional and money driven that my friend seems so disappointed with amongst our peer community here. I thought I was doing things to help others as much as I could, even to the expense of not posting, not earning income lately on steemit and had expressed that I need to think more about myself. This prompted a sure, why not, everybody else does, kind of response in the dialog with my friend and it sent me to bed that night after our chat, deep in thought about how I could "do better" as she also recently suggested to some folks within my ear shot.
So actually, this "getting sent to bed thinking" just happened last night, and this post is the brain barf that is coming from the deep dive into my own actions around this community as I drifted into a restless sleep last night on the couch within reach of my steemit home, unable to even find the energy to leave my office building to go home to my actual mountain side cabin.
How can I do better?
How can I contribute even more, take even less, still feel whole about my involvement and the give and take of gifts and rewards and feel like I am a benefit to others rather than a burden on them? How can I help the less fortunate or less adequately equipped among our pool of minnows here on steemit? What can I do to help change the negative patterns sneaking in on the coattails of human nature as the pond gets bigger and more densely populated with new arrivals?
I know I can do better. Just gimme a chance!
I joke with this phrase a lot, "I can do better, gimme a chance" but it's really true and not just for me. It's true for everyone but sometimes the second half, "gimme a chance" is the part we need help with.
I'm not sure how I'm going to change my behaviors on steemit yet. I am already not one to self vote at all, and I already comment and participate as much as human time clocks allow for, and I already have tried to build new communication tools for the communities voices to use as they see mostly see fit, via the radio station, and I am working hard to maintain that as an opportunity rich environment where literally anyone can join MSP and get some air time on the station to voice their opinions, views, creative interests and musical tastes, while potentially empowering them with new angles on the money making aspects of steemit via this increased exposure, available to pretty much anyone able to voice their desire to do so and commit to a two hour weekly time slot consistently and professionally and maturely.
But what else can I do? I have given money to the needy on here, and I use tips to boost my modest vote values on posts I find value in. I am depositing now and then, and spending and spreading more on sharing with deserving others and growing the community than I am earning in return.
But I WILL do better. Gimme a chance!
I also decided I could do better about remembering important people in my life outside steemit. So I decided to celebrate my two month anniversary weekend on steemit (62 days today since I first even heard of the joint and signed up) by going back over to facebook, where I have barely even shown my face for two months and checking in with my nearly 750 life long friends and family over there. This is what I had to say to them after all this time away, spent here on steemit instead. Perhaps continue trying to get them to come finally discover our beautiful home here on steemit.
Just letting you know I'm still alive. I've been off doing great things on steemit.com and am proud to announce I also have just launched a radio station that streams globally 24/7 to every corner of the Earth, featuring 22 DJs so far, with fourteen 2 hour live audience interactive talk, news and music shows already on the schedule and premiered this week and just getting started. Still adding new shows and DJs daily to fill the schedule. I'll drop a link here next time I go on the air and maybe you all can give a listen.As for my steemit results, and this "make money doing FB like stuff" thing I kept trying to tell you all about, well, the proof continues here, and this is after withdrawing a bunch to pay for radio station related expenses like royalty licensing for commercial music and the media servers and software licenses we needed for me to produce a real-deal world wide legal broadcast network.
Find out more about steemit at http://steemit.com and more about the steemit sub-community I take part in leading at http://minnowsupportproject.org and about the radio station I built with the help of some friends at http://mspwaves.com
Join steemit.com - the only social network based on a cryptocurrency block chain that pays you to participate.It's no joke and it's not a flash in the pan. Anyone in crypto can tell you block chain tech and cryptocurrencies are quite assuredly here to stay. Come get ya some. My friends in the Minnow Support Project and I will get you there.
In 61 days at Steemit, I have earned over $2000.00 USD extra income. So put that in your pipe and smoke it. I sure did (with some of it anyway lol) ;)
So the real question still remains, I'm not a rich man, but I want to give, so how can I "do better"?
For now, the best idea I've got is to come up with some kind of way to give tangible things to folks who could otherwise never obtain them, so that they can get ahead. Like maybe I could find a microphone and headphones for a disadvantaged kid in Africa who could be the world's next huge thought provoking media journalist or a decent tablet or laptop for the world's next great writer currently living impoverished in some eastern block country somewhere.
I don't know. I'm good at ideas, but they are not always good ideas. I'm told to think globally, act locally, and to change the world by changing one life at a time. I'm as much in a position to do some great things as I've ever been, and by nature of being merely average in the USA, I am still very aware that puts me at great advantage over most of the rest of the planet. So what things to do for the world? I could focus on doing things for myself, or I could focus on doing them for others, which in turn would likely lead to even more gains for my own soul and peace of mind, which are the real riches and success I hope to achieve.
I do know that when the plane is crashing, you need to put your own oxygen mask on before you help the person next to you, and I've still got some stuff to take care of in my own life, but I want to get ready to give more than ever, because I've almost got my own security adjusted now. Time to plan ahead for the next phases of growth. Mine and others wherever I can do the most good.
Help me out with some ideas on how I can use the power of the network, my involvement in it's largest minnow community, our radio station and my voice and other talents and capabilities to do more, be better and help more people fly here. How can I help YOU on steemit today, in a sustainable, holistic, positive way?
Money pays the bills, but love both given and received, is where the wealth of a man really comes from.
And you can take that to the bank!
Just like that, this post is over.
Full steem ahead, steemitizens!
Tune into my show: Monday Night Minnow School on The MSP Waves Radio Network
Get more info about this and other great steemit MSP talk-radio shows at:
http://mspwaves.com
Witnesses I support:
@aggroed, @teamsteem, @gtg, @timcliff, @klye, @clayop, @ausbitbank, @dragosroua, @rolandp, @jesta, @personzzz ( @personz ), @lok1, @someguy123, @thecryptodrive, @netuoso, @good-karma, @lukestokes.mhth, @klye, @theprophet0, @swelker101, @steemed and co-witnesses @followbtcnews & @crimsonclad
Think you deserve to be on this list too?
Earn my vote. Tell me why!
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The Peace, Abundance, Liberty Network (PALNET) Minnow Support Project (MSP) is home for a minnows best new friends!
Find us on Chat with the PAL/Minnow Support Project peeps at: https://discord.gg/HYj4yvw