For several years I have wanted to start my own blog. Hell, I've always been able to form complete and sometimes even fully functional sentences. I want to write words that will inspire the masses, soothe the souls of the downtrodden and if I can make just a few people spit milk out of their noses from reading my posts then I will have considered it all worth it.
I've poked around on the internet for quite some time too. I wrote a book of poetry and self published it on Amazon.com. I've written music and posted it for sale on several different music websites. I even have 3 different Youtube channels. We won't talk about sales or subscribers, and that's all I'm going to say about that. With all of that being said, I should be able to start my own blog right?
Back in February of this year (2018) I decided to give it a shot and after watching some videos on Youtube about this new website steemit.com my wife and I decided it would be the perfect place to start. I signed up and waited the 2 - 47 week waiting period and was approved after just 3 weeks. So I logged on and wrote my first post. I received a reply on this post from someone asking me if I was on Discord. After the minimal research I had done on how the crypto driven Steemit worked I thought I was being invited to some kind of magical online world. I created my own Discord account and joined a couple of channels. I met some great people who taught me a lot and I still connect with occasionally. One day my oldest son Kevin asks me if I have a Discord account. (How does HE know about this magical world?) Apparently all of the young people of the world know about Discord. I tell him that of course I do, because I am a fucking gamer who live streams on Twitch (This was new to me as well.)
Anyhow, one of the channels I was invited to early on was the Whaleshares channel. My first evening in there and someone says "Who wants to win some Whaleshares?" I turned on my best Arnold Horshack and raised my hand and said "ohhh, oooh, oooh, here Mr. Kotter, here", fortunately no-one could hear me because it was not a voice activated channel. I had NO idea what a Whaleshare was but I sure as shit wasn't about to miss out on the chance to win some of them.
I learned about contests through various Discord channels and was able to create some pretty cool posts by entering them. My account was slowly growing and I was getting posts out, this shit is great. Alas though, life gets busy and sometimes we get stymied by other responsibilities. I started going weeks without posting and every time I logged back into Steemit things had changed.
One day I logged into Discord and was going through some of my favorite channels but no-one was there. I'd say hello and hear echoes... echoes... echoes... In place of the Whaleshares Channel icon was a Pink Panther icon, someone decided to change the icon. I didn't recognize the people in the Discord channel and thought I was being Punk'd but Ashton Kutcher never did show up. So I went into a channel frequented by musicians and saw a post from a guy who was posting his music on Choon. What the fuck? I've got to give this a try too. I started uploading some of my songs to Choon and I've been receiving almost daily emails about the "Notes" I've been earning.
I did ultimately find my way back to the Whaleshares Discord channel after receiving an email that my Whaleshares account had been approved (Damn! That was months ago.) and have recently started posting on Whaleshares.io as well.
All in all my head is still spinning but I think to answer the question "Has Steemit Enriched My Life Or Led Me Down A Spiral Into The Deepest Depths Of Confusion?"
I would have to respond with a resounding ENRICHED MY LIFE!
I was able to take a majority of the posts that I had written and transfer them over to my very own blog site at Trippin Brehenys and for that I can only be grateful.
See you on Discord.
The Hive - By invite only.
A.S.A.P er's - By invite only.
*Image provided by pixabay.com (labeled for reuse)