A couple days ago, I spent more than 5 hours working on this article.  I spent 2+ hours interviewing more than 8 people, another 2 hours writing the article itself, and at least 1 more hour doing research and collecting statistics to make sure my work was sound.

Do you want to know how much I earned for all that effort?  Here, I'll show you.

A little over 0.20 USD.  Or if you want the math, about 4 US Cents per hour.

Why?

Why did I do this?  Why did it do so poorly?  Why is Steemit so unfair?  What's the point of me spending so much time on an article only to have it hardly even be read?  What on earth am I doing working for 4 cents an hour?  People in third-world countries working child labor get paid more than that.  So why am I doing this?  What's the motivation?  Why am I even on Steemit?

I'll tell you why.

It's not about the money.

Steemit is not a job, you don't get paid for 9 to 5 shifts every other Friday after you turn in your paystubs.  Steemit is not going to make you an overnight success, it's not a ponzi scheme, it's not a penny stock, and it's not a "get rich quick" scheme.  It's not about the money.  I mean, it is, sort of, lots of people flooded here with high hopes of earning top dollar on their posts, but take a step back for a second.  Think about this:

Steemit wasn't created with the idea in mind of "Hey let's come up with a way to make everyone rich.".

Steemit was created with "Hey let's come up with a way for people to share their ideas and interests and entertain each other, but let's put a twist on it and tie a cryptocurrency to the system, so people can do all of those things and maybe even get rewarded on top of it.".

It's about dedication.

Dedication to your work, dedication to who you are, and dedication to supporting the idea of Steemit, even if you profit from none of those.  Most people that made themselves rich in life will tell you to never give up, to always stay dedicated to your true self, and to follow your aspirations.  I don't care if my post made me less than a child making Nike shoes in a third-world country sweatshop makes, because I write my posts to entertain people, to educate people, and to, if at all possible, make a difference in the lives of the few people that do read them.

It's about faith.

I'm not talking about faith in God, or faith in anything religious.  I'm talking about faith in the system, and faith in yourself.  If you keep working hard and writing posts you are passionate about, if you have faith in yourself, you will eventually be that person that you see that made a few hundred or even a few thousand dollars on their post.  It mike take you one day, a week, or even a year, but somewhere along the line you will succeed.  I know a guy that made over $700 writing an post about fucking doorstoppers.  Who even writes about that? Him, evidently.  But I bet you he didn't do it because he thought it'd make him rich, he did it because he thought doorstoppers were fuckin' cool.

As always, thanks for reading!  For more interesting content, please Follow me @voltarius!