I liked reading your post.
It basically boils down to being patient and to persevere. Many of my posts are only getting like pennies and many times not even. But I just tag along. I was kinda lucky the first month or so I was here. I posted something that I cooked and it did made a good payout because one individual with a gigantic sp voted for me. At that time I didn't know about it or how to know if the person has a lot of sp. Overtime I read others' posts and that's how I found it out. So, I followed that person. A month or so after that I made another post on cooking again and that same person voted me for it. So, I was and I am grateful for that. Understanding that if you do good work, someone somewhere out there will recognize it.
I think you don't just leave a platform because you're not getting what you want. Just keep plugging along and try the best that you can or that I can. There are so many things to learn here on top of everything else. So there's plenty of time to test the water before actually quitting. But who wants to quit anyways?