No one will leave this guide without learning something important.
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If I Only Realize this Now, It's Gotta Be Not Well-Known
If you want to succeed on Steemit, this is the one thing that I feel that actually "know" that will put you on the path to being a greater Steemian, and of course I am willing to share it! Strategy being used loosely, because my main intent wasn't even to achieve this, that still boggles my mind at times.
Sure, any human or bot can make a comment. Play this exercise with me!
1- Think of every Steemit account in terms of a guesstimate
2- First, remove every single auto-generated spam comment
3- Next, take away every beg comment and generic "good post" one too
4- Now mentally remove the titles and headers from your post, and the comments that could be made solely on that information alone
Starting to get quiet here, but we're not done yet.
5- Now take a look at the remaining comments. How many of them feel empty inside?
Like the person took the time to read it, but that's all—they didn't care enough to even try to understand it? It will be hard to recognize at first, but you will feel it.
6- Any comments remaining after this point are the people that I feel will really make a difference on Steemit in the future.
My goal wasn't to be the person at step 6, but to take one more step—blind to all of this. For content that added an extra mark into my own world; it was this.
7- To write such an amazing comment that when the author reads it, they literally need to know who you are.
There's a lot of counter-intuitive logic in this. Isn't their post supposed to be about them, and not you? By commenting a post you are expressing your gratitude to an author. The quality of your comment however makes a difference in whether you are giving a superficial compliment, or was genuinely moved by their piece.
Some of my best comments were made on incredibly long posts and not easy to grasp topics. Luckily for me, I was genuinely intersted in these ideas and expressions. There were parts I could understand, but also new parts that I wanted to explore and add to that current understanding. I appreciated their messages in these writings so much that I set up a little game for myself.
I'm going to write a comment so absolutely ridiculous that the author will not believe it was possible for someone to care as much as THEM about what they wrote. I want them to question everything they thought they knew, expanding their knowledge as much they did mine in sharing their article to me. It's a terrifying albeit a slightly sadistic thing to do, but for good reason.
I say sadistic because I imagined in depth how it would go down. You see, I don't run around commenting everything and promoting myself for the sheer sake of putting my name out there. The author will read my comment, lose their shit, and want to know more about me. This is something I learned earlier on. I mean who exactly could be open minded enough to suspend their beliefs to try to understand yours as close as they possibly could and spin it back with any relationships they could make to your own life? The real secret here is to comment only things that you genuinely love.
I am doubly lucky that I decided not to niche write and have a purpose and message behind all of my posts as well. Because I was able to find their message and brought about an initial surprise, they chose to seek me out and learn if I had real messages in my own writing, and when they were found there was a second surprise for them.
Circle Jerking Versus Genuine Author Support
From the outside both of these things look identical but this I feel this is an incorrect view. Sure, there may be people who pay to receive votes, or have some kind of behind the scenes deal but what about everyone else who recieves votes from the same accounts on a more consistent basis? It took me a long time to understand this as being one of these authors.
There are two main ways you can be supported on Steemit from blogging, and I've been fortunate enough to experience both in depth. The first one is through producing high-quality, unique and valuable content. Three of my first posts out of the box, put me on front page of trending back in July 2017. All different topics.
I chose to come to Steemit and didn't know a single person or have even one friend here. This shows me that yes, many people and groups do work tirelessly combing through as many posts they can read to discover good content. It can take a while to get discovered but this isn't a myth. I still believe that if you put out the best posts that you can, somebody will eventually find you. For seeing potential in and building up new authors @curie, you guys are the real mvps.
The second method can be misunderstood as "circle-jerking". It's actually in many cases author support. Remember having your reason to write a post and the messages that you want to share with others? I can and have written on a wide variety of categories and topics, so at some point I realized I was still being supported, although it had far less to do with what category my post was actually in.
Imma be real on what author support entails, the good and the bad. Realistically speaking it is impossible to be interested in every topic, all the time... This becomes especially difficult when it's a foreign subject to a reader. Commenting is the one way that we build connections with others. You relate and strengthen a bond with another person, and they will want to be just as thoughtful as you were to them. There appears to be a type of appreciation that exists when someone really wanted to understand you, and a strong connection emerges.
You both will never understand each other 100% but for a moment it feels like you do. I've finally come to grasp that author support means that they may not understand or have interests in a good number of your posts, they aren't actually supporting your posts at this point—they are supporting YOU. -And if what you write is truly important to you, then it becomes important to them too. REALLY. You can write whatever moves you.
And the people that come to support you will have real trust and faith in you that anything you are going to post in the future will have an impactful meaning to others, even if they themselves cannot understand it. There is no additional proof needed other than your solid interactions with them through comments. It does suck sometimes to feel like your post is unvaluable, but if it's already valuable to you, that already makes one person, a second person is more likely.
Overcoming My Communication Anxiety on Steemit
Let me tell you my biggest Steemit secret on why I haven't commented your post... at least not yet, for anyone who ever wonders this. I have a gut feeling that this happens. I'm working currently on improving this, by only interacting with the posts I truly enjoy and can understand, and shortening my comment legnth.
I spend majority of my time on Steemit worrying about commenting so much that I dedicate time to only comment others and nothing else. I wil be honest, my personal interests are highly specific but if someone I care about posts something that means a lot to them, I take the extra time to try to understand it and really be there for them. I frustrate myself at a blank keyboard a lot, searching for meaning on topics I want to but are unable to understand. Thinking hard about the entirety of their piece and what my comment will be like and the message I want to convey back to them. I try to comment as many people as I can, but I'm always too slow.
I face some issues with being able to read, understand, and reply quickly enough, and although it's not my personal responsibility I'm aware of the impact it has on those around me.
If I'm going to comment someone I want to not only understand the content but the context of the author behind it. There are infinite number of topics, so why did they want to choose this one over everything else? I do the best that I can to be fully in the moment when commenting, because I want to encourage others by appreciating them. We have proof of work and proof of stake, I like to imagine this as proof of reading.
What Happens When You Don't Communicate?
The empty space from a failure to connect is filled by negative imagination and illusions of lower self-worth, it's not only yourself. The other person not being communicated with also experiences this.
What's funny is the person experiencing anxiety is scared of letting the other person down, but then when they didn't talk, the one non-maliciously being ignored wonders if they matter to the friend with anxiety. Everyone ends up sad, because we were all scared and wanted that reassurance from each other.
You can be scared and still genuinely love and care for others, but it will begin to become destructive unless you can conquer your fears of not reaching out. I've spent unimaginable amounts of time worrying if my comment would be good enough for my receiver. Reflecting on it now, leaving a comment rather than nothing at all is a proper choice in this case. I just figured this out.
I get heart broken when I finally make it to the blogs of friends and authors I really like, but when I get to their page too late, they had left Steemit—or stopped posting regularly. I write some insanely long posts, and so do my friends and followers. Sometimes I'm outside and can't watch a video out of consideration to my current company, other times I have homework or other errands with precedence over people period. Everyone is busy, but too busy to spend some time out of a single day? Sometimes yes, it doesn't mean you are not in my thoughts.
My last post was something I needed to write, giving myself the most honest view I could muster, it had errors and doesn't even have a photo in it. But what I can say is that all 10 comments I received were from people I've commented at legnth in the past on their posts or have given earnest interaction with in my own posts. And they really cared about what I had to say even after I wasn't sure it would have been the best idea to write it at all.
I'm not even going to get into being in such an obscure timezone that oftentimes when I post, many people are asleep. Luckily I came to understand that it didn't have as great of an impact in the big picture.
It's genuinely demotivating to spill yourself into something and feel like it doesn't matter to people at all.
It's Never as Bad as We Tell Ourselves
I want to tell a few short stories that upon a second look, helped me to realize that my anxiety is an illusion by lending me the courage to work through it.
I have a friend that lost their last job for multiple no calls no shows, throughout their position. They would wake up an hour or two into their shift and would give up all motivation. Their workplace probably thought that they didn't care. What happened was that this friend felt incredibly bummed out for letting everyone down. It's scary to make others feel sadness and pain, and I can see where he's coming from. There was a point in time where if I was late for a shift, I felt worthless and quit jobs entirely. I told him recently to call and tell them when this happens and that although not a great situation, it's still better to try.
I have another friend that was battling through depression, and called me super early one moring. I have a rule not to call at strange times, but they said it was an actual emergency. They absolutely loved their job as a line cook, but due to their state of well-being they didn't feel okay. 3 shifts back to back no call no show and they had called me asking for advice at a complete loss. I told them that they should call their head chef and tell them the truth of what they were going through.
One memory that I cherish dearly is when I used to be a morning prep cook at the first job I really loved. I woke up an hour into my shift one day, and had a borderline heart attack. I really wanted to be there, so I called the store to talk to my manager and tell her I overslept. She laughed and told me to enjoy the day off. The following day, she looked me in the eyes and said;
"If you ever have a problem, tell us what it is. If we know what the problem is, we can help you solve it."
For reasons that I may never fully comprehend, I remember it sometimes. I told my friend that wanted advice this, assuring them that I think if they tried and told the truth, it would work out. They did that, and they still work there now.
Fear can mess up anyone. I used to miss assignments then give up and fail classes that I was initially getting A's and B's in. I felt that I let my classmates and proffesor down each time, and I was not smart enough to pass no matter how hard I tried. When your world falls apart, the last thing that we can do—even when the vision of a brighter future begins to dim is to try. This is what I mean when I say that hope comes from despair.
To anyone who has followed along my last couple of weeks, I was feeling down enough that I missed my entire past week of school. All assignments. Nobody is perfect, and I'm proud of myself now for beginning to see this. I was able to email my professor and explain what was happening with me, and got the extensions required to make up my missing work.
Let me state this again, it's NEVER as bad as we tell ourselves. While a person can exist in a world surrounded by the idea of "not getting your hopes too high", I'm trying to not let my hopes fall through the cracks. This was an excellent journey, and is helping me to learn something I believe to be a missing key fundamental in my own life. There needs to be a balance between caring and action (no matter how scary), otherwise you may drive yourself insane with worry.
The action doesn't even have to be large, a step is infinitely better than none at all. Being brave enough to take the tiniest step forward despite everything is important. I think that I finally realized that an action isn't always equivalent to the sentiment behind it.
Thank you for everything that you stand for and do @clayboyn, @curie, @inquiringtimes, @rok-sivante, and @teamsteem. While this post may exist to help Steemians better understand the importance of commenting, I can better understand and express my thoughts to help me work through my greatest fears and anxiousness by being here. I also wrote it for you to express my gratitude for all that you've done for me. From being on Steemit and interacting with you, THIS is the impact you left on my life.
Love the thought and personal touch into your content. its really cool also seeing that you have such engaged followers.
your journey through steemit must be quite an interesting one! Glad to have been part of it :)
Thank you @masterroshi!
I want my blogs to resemble me as best as I can reflect it outwards. Yeah for real, I am losing it—I have to type faster even if it means sometimes not having a full effect with my words.
Thank you for wanting to be a part of it, everything gets more interesting by the day ^_^
Hmm... I don't just know where to start my comment from @shello 😁. I have this astonishing attitude of reading your post no matter how long it is due to the impact you poured into me. You made me feel hopeful on steemit despite my low earnings. Thanks for your support 🙌😀.
Commenting on people post has been a major source of success for most people on steemit today. Just as you have said "leave comment that will make the author curious to know more about you." Good quality comment can lead to social interaction and communication amongst steemit members which enhances support and success.
I don't sometimes feel comfortable if I don't read your blog sometimes. This is due to the legacy you have laid towards me when you visit my blog sometimes with comprehensive act and good comment. I can testify to what you've spoken about on how extremely busy everyone is such that you go on errand and perform your daily activities. But the real fact is you never forget your real friends on steemit which I am proud and happy to be one of them🙌😁.
I noticed your post scarcity that past weeks and also I became suspicious when I read one of your recent article about your depression.
I want you to know you are special with powerful qualities. Don't be discouraged by your performance in school or your professor's reaction towards you. There is huge success coming your way, you just have to keep trying and never give up as you always tell me 😁. Just keep believing yourself, avoid distractions, focus, be determined, don't think you can please everyone because you are to live and love your life happily.
Nods I'm working on making all of my comments shorter, because I can easily lose the words to speak. I want to be online more instead of fearing what to do when I write. I have a load to catch up on, and am trying to push myself a little more these days.
Depression is not fun at all. A big part of it is thinking more than doing, and I know this. I have to remember that while although I want to conciously be in the moment, it's a state of mind, and not a permanent state of being.
I'm blessed to have awesome friends always leaving me comments :D And although mine are late today, I appreciate you! <3
U are always welcome @shello with love from @hardaeborla
💕
Hello @shello,
A lot of very large topics here and what I'm going to contribute to (as part of the conversation thread) is related to Commenting.
I've kind of just pulled myself along on Steemit. In a couple of months, I'll be celebrating my 2nd Steemit anniversary/birthday. (So, I've seen some things. LMAO)
I have to say that I have made some fantastic friends whom I consider to be family.
That tight a friendship bond starts when you give a person a chance to get to know you a little bit by or through chatting or commenting.
I can only get to a handful of blogs every day but I have always made a point of responding to comments on my posts and UPVOTING comments especially when I know/feel that the person has put some thought into their comment OR if I know the person isn't communicating to me in their native language. I know that most of the time, it's only a few cents but I like to think that every little bit helps to encourage people to keep trying and not give up. It's my way of giving back to as many people as I can.
I think it's serendipitous when folks fine their way to my blog and when they return, I like to treat them exactly how I would treat them if they had showed up at my house as a guest.
I'm glad I stopped to read your post today...it's nice to get to know you a little better. ;)
Wohohoho hello @rebeccaryan!
Happy almost 2 years :D It's very easy to type for the sake of putting a comment there, instead of fully making use of the words typed. I love reading and responding to comments, although sometimes it can become overbearing when I can't think of a reply as good as the comment left lmao!
It's nice to see when others read your blogs, and I'm right there with you with my tiny votes on that—anything is still better than nothing. The pleasure is mine, and thank you for finding your way over here <3
With love,
@shello
I find it strange that more people don't inject a bit of personality into their comments. This is the internet! Isn't the whole point to interact with humans with wildly different views?
It's weird because some people are perfectly okay with shouting into the void... but goddess forbid people shout back. Insane, right?
I think people forget that they are braver than they believe, after all you made an account where you're free to profess all your opinions for the world. That takes a wee bit of courage , no?
Indeed it does take courage, and even I'm a fraidy cat at times. But I am starting to see why sometimes it's hard to comment or even reply—when my head is all wrapped up in other things. I overthink very easily, and oftentimes a comment that should take me a couple minutes ends up being much longer.
I like shouting into the void... Sometimes it shouts back c;
And that is the beauty of the internet (^o^)
There's always someone that might hear you out :3
Hey, @shello I found out about you from @staceyjean's recent article about a radio interview you did recently with @clayboyn. I hope it is recorded somewhere I would love to hear it. Discovering you are here has instantly changed my life. I feel like this happened because I recently made some conscious changes in my life to shift/change my life and rewrite it and live it the way I want and get away from this life of semi-hell I am living in. I have been reading your blog for the last 40minutes, not how I planned my day would go. But it was like traveling to another time zone and it was refreshing, a mastermind session and an answer, so many answers for me all wrapped up in a box as a gift. I do two things on Steemit more than other things that is Poetry and Curation. You are now on my list to curate next, I will give you a heads up when the post drops. Also, your diary entry #18 when you talked about "k" "P" "B" and "S" As an outside observer what I see is that the shift occurred the minute you told, "S" that you would literally trade anything in the world to be friends with "K" again. "S" reaction to that set things in motion in a major way. Sometimes we don't have to say anything our feelings can permeate the atmosphere in such a way that it can make magical things happen or if it's low energy it can funk up space to the point where it makes it toxic. A person's reaction to another can cause a domino affect that can continue from one frame to another. Overall what I saw as an outside observer is your role in it all as well as the role you show and become in different areas of your life like here on Steemit. Your role in the story and in the lives of all the characters mentioned, you are "the Constant". the glue and they all know that whether they know it consciously or subconsciously. I thank you so much for that diary entry. Would like you to talk more on so many things in that entry you talked about such as What we do to cause our past to change and the subject you mentioned about Character Breaking and going deeper into the meaning of Retrocausality. I give thanks for who you are and all that you do @shello. You Rock. Stay Awesome ~ Ren
WOAH! I think that's too much time to be spending on my blog, but I am grateful nonetheless @rensoul17! As far as reality shifts go, I think you are right—as soon as we change our mental state, it's as though we are dawning rose-colored sunglasses to match our new core belief with the rest of our reality. By doing this, I believe that we become more intune with opportunities we would have missed otherwise.
That diary entry was a lot of me working out what I noticed around me, all of the things that began to change that made me wonder why coincidence would not be enough to suffice. I wholehreartedly believe that when we chhange our perspective, our actions and reactions begin to manifest in the world around us. Other people respond in kind, but I think it's mostly subconcious—if the whole scenario wasn't weird enough already!
I take character breaking as a sign of a reality shift. Also that since the only real moment we experience right now is the current moment, the future and the past must be in flux—only held in place by how we choose to envision or recall an experience.
There will be more reality shifting posts, but please bear with me, it takes a lot of focus to be able to writer this type of subject. I better go check out what @staceyjean had to say!!
I believe this to be true as well.
The love is real thank you so much!
@shello
Thank you for responding. I love the fact that you are an experimentalist as well. Based on what you said about reality shift. To me this is such good news because for the past year I have been gradually making a progressive move in a new direction in life. And two days ago I asked myself why did it take so long for me to do it. And I thought about how I repeated the same failures or mis -takes so many times and as well experienced the same drama. And what came to me was It was not just what I experienced but also where I was, my actions, my thoughts, kept me in the same space and I only attracted those that shared the same type of space as well and our frames or bubbles magnetically found each other. It's like when a person says I don't like being here. Here is actually a place within the physical construct we live in. I feel its like being in a twilight zone with glass windows and you can see across the street but you can't get there because you are not suppose to be there based on your thoughts, mindset and your actions up to this point, but if you radically changed the way you thought everything would shift and your environment and the frames in which you were previously stuck would fall away and the elevator doors to that construct within a construct would magically open. I hope I did not lose you. Please share with me what you think based on what you know to be truth I am open and trying to figure it all out and I hope I did not waste your time. @shello.
Heya @rensoul17,
I'm tasting some existential crisis here. I'm so happy that Steemit actually brought me someone that knows what the f*** I'm talking about. Although my musings are interesting, I feel appreciated—let me see what I can do. That diary entry was only the most recent shift (as there were many more in the same timeline before this one).
I also wrote a post that might help with the reoccurring events, errors and mistakes that you appear to be going through regardless of how much you feel you should be progressing. It's at the bottom of this comment, and for me—learning the lesson inside each experience allowed me to transform any past negative situation into something positive, more align and in tune with the reality I wanted to shift towards!
A mistake I found when trying to shift to a different reality than the current one you are experiencing is in recalling a memory. Retrocausality okay? Hope I don't lose you here.
Every time we recall a memory, it's of an event that no longer exists—only now exists. So when we remember, what we do is solidify thoughts and reinforce with emotion our energy from now, into that past memory. Making it stronger and harder to shift. This is important.
You have to choose to remember the event differently, but it still has to be believable to you. So when I see a situation that was bad and not what I wanted, I look for that hidden lesson that will bring me one step closer.
Right now, I imagine that you can see the reality you want—but it's behind a glass, and you can't break through to the same plane it's on.
It's exactly this. BUT! You have to continue to persist long after you could think of giving up. I'm not going to lie to you, things like this to most rational people is borderline insanity. I've already seen some crazy shi* though. You won't be able to raise the dead okay? But if you've ever heard of the string of fate that connects everyone and everything. It's very much real, and your reality can move through it.
I'm more than willing to continue exploring reality shifting.
With love,
@shello
https://steemit.com/thebestgameshowever/@shello/welcome-to-the-show-the-wheel-of-life-experiences-you-re-already-playing
Oh you talking about DNA explosions, and light bulbs coming on, yES!!! I get you I do get I got to get the lesson and Oh I will not be giving up I get tired but I 'm not giving up. I have heard of the string of fate but have not experienced it. I want to experience it. My gift is clairsentient. I feel everything, when my boyfriend says one thing but his emotions and thoughts are screaming something dark and low energy it totally shuts me down, yet I have learned with him and others and situations to be ahead of the game,I have a knowing that allows me to prepare and know what to do way before stuff happens. Now I am preparing to pick up and move to another state in the fall I don't know how its going to happen but I have a deep knowing that it will to the point that I can taste and feel it. Its exciting and I don't mind living on that mental edge I know how far to go and where not to roam. And you seem to have just magically appeared when I read your first post it was confirmation that a door had been opened to the level of life I want to live at and surround myself only with people that are breathing air at that level. Speaking of solidifying thoughts and reinforcing with emotion our energy can that not also work with what we want to project for the future that will become the present. Can't I imagine and feel how my dream life design would be (like they said in the movie The Secret) long enough to bring it from thought into physical manifestation kind of like you did with "k". I don't know where your are or what time it is, but its really late here like 4:30am. So I am going to bring this convo to a close. I do hope you respond and I am loving all of this and it is needed. Thank you I will be reading and rereading so much that you said and the link you left. I am grateful.
Take your time replying c: This is the most fun I've had in quite a while.
Yeah, a lot of times it will feel that all the effort is for naught—but those are the exact times not to be giving up! In a way, learning the lesson will free you of the experience. I've looked the internet over for more clues regarding the string of fate that connects everyone to no avail. What I can say is that you will be able to believe in anything once you see it happen.
Clairsentient? At some level everyone has some psychic ability, but like any other skill it can be trained. Sometimes I know some really weird things without any foreknowledge. Another's energy field can shut people down, I think it comes to being able to refocus and redirect our own energies.
Moving to a different state, will end up how you think it will. Your story is beginning to remind me of my first reality shift and how it all started. I had to mentally break myself to achieve it, but I'll never regret it. I've decided to post it at some point but it will be a really long write up.
The Secret had some very valid points, but I feel in it's presentation, a lot of it was skewed in "over glamorization". Now I do want you to keep in mind that I'm just another person, and by no means a teacher in any spiritual sense. I'm also excited because "K" had manifested twice since that post—both indirectly, but it's a nod that the energy signature is present.
It's 10:51 pm Hawaii time, you must be on the East Coast somewhere!! Get some sleep, and we'll catch this up again soon!~ <3
Regarding the string of fate, this is what I found on the internet that I thought was rather interesting. http://www.superconsciousness.com/topics/science/we-are-all-connected
And I also found this one which kind of goes in a different direction but may have some merit. The reason I included this one is because for decades I have had this memory of a biblical story in my head that has to do with the tribes of Israel's rescue this woman who sneaked them into the city of their enemies by leaving them a sign that it was the time to attack.
The sign she left was a crimson cord hanging from the top of an outer wall, which also happened to be where this woman lived(inside of the wall)
Anyway because of this woman who was considered a harlot helped God's chosen people the Israelites were able to take the city and when they left they took the woman with them. I traced the lineage of this woman from the Old Testament to the New Testament of the Bible and it led all the way to Jesus Christ, which meant she was destined to be apart of the Israelites history and lineage.
(My Doctorate Degree is in World Religious Studies and the languages that accompanied these Religions.) So here is the second link.
http://www.faena.com/aleph/articles/the-legend-of-the-red-string-of-japan/
Also regarding me moving to a different State soon where I will have 2 roommates, I found your aritcle extremely helpful and I will share it with the other two people that I will be rooming with. This is your article to which I am referring. https://steemit.com/saving-money/@shello/the-ultimate-guide-to-frugal-living-how-i-can-afford-to-live-in-a-condo-in-hawaii