Has it really been that long? Nahhhh that can't be right!
It was six years ago today that I was sitting in our $80 USD a month art/music studio overlooking the ocean, a few months before the 1 year contract ended and the building was renovated and turned into a "fancy art zone" and rent went up to $2000 a month. (Bye bye studio)
I had just finished writing a short story which would later become a chapter in Confessions of the Damaged 1.1 and was watching a rather unconvincing conspiracy theory video and was checking the comments just to see if I was the only one thinking "nah!". I saw a comment mentioning Steemit and went to check it out.
Not expecting much, and not sure how things worked, I typed a random username to sign up.... "
Not the username I would have chosen had I actually believed that I could earn money and make friends from this platform, but I grew to love it. I browsed a bit and posted my first post, got a big upvote and reblog from 
Holy shit, $21!? What!
It felt like the answer to my prayers.
Obviously it was more complicated than that. If we wanted to support others, we'd need to power up, community participation seemed to matter more than post quality sometimes, and there was a whole lot of circle jerking and shitposting back then. It was a pretty complicated ecosystem with all kinds of characters, lots of great people and lots of difficult people. Just like life. It even a maniac that went by the name Bernie Sanders.
Some dudes named Ned and Dan were in charge, and I had no idea how blockchains or economies worked, I just knew that I had just earned something that could be exchanged for the paper money I was used to and even more importantly BITCOIN!
I had been watching bitcoin since 2011 and kept thinking that I wanted to get in but I was trying to enjoy life without work after quitting my job in 2012, and ended up drifting around Asia, essentially homeless and penniless by 2013.
That's when I started my experiment in the idea of a "Gift Economy", working for free and accepting the kindness of others. In 2015 I decided I was sick of fleas and sleeping on uncomfortable surfaces so I worked to save money for ay year, hated the job and quit, then started having serious back issues that doctors didn't seem to have an answer to and made it harder to play music which was my passion at the time.
Did a slow 12 city tour but it destroyed me. It was the best time of my life but because of my back pain it was not something I could do again.
I was feeling a bit lost. Scared to get into a work grind that would make my health worse, and also not very skilled in anything that paid well, eager to share my creativity with the world, but not focused or energized or able to sit for long periods of time or strap a guitar around my neck.
I started writing but didn't know where or how to share my stories.
Steemit felt like a good place to share them. It was not. My babies disappeared into a sea of posts after 7 days. BUT it was an AMAZING place to share my thoughts and feelings and experiences, and to experiment with different modes of output.
From here let's call it Hive because that's what it is now. We went through the Tron takeover shit and the fork was when I really started to feel like this was home for me on the internet.
There are a lot of things that I did for the first time because of Hive, and a lot of transformations I went through, in a large part thanks to Hive. Let me make a list for you to try and finish this post up sooner rather than later:
- I found my very first readers, and they became good friends.
- I made my first connection to Africa and South America, also many good friends.
- I earned my first cryptocurrency.
- I learned to act as a leader for the first time, with initiatives such a Cross Culture.
- I got over my fear of attention and faced the fact that I kind of enjoyed it, not lots of it, just being respected for my contributions.
- I got over politics. I still care, and I still have opinions, but I focus more on my own life and the changes I can make around me now.
- I learned how the economy works, and I learned how cryptocurrency works. Thanks to this I got a more full picture of the direction the world is heading in.
- I pushed myself to create new things, freewriting, poetry, essays, vlogs, podcasts.
- I learned how to edit video, audio and photos, at least the basics.
- I started a Youtube channel and Spotify podcast in an attempt to create multiple income streams. I wouldn't have had confidence, skills necessary or motivation to do this without Hive.
- I felt rich for the first time in my life when Hive and Bitcoin were at their ATH.
- I got to see how society works in the form of a microcosm, because that is essentially what Hive is, a mini society. There are all the same kinds of people but it's easier to influence because of the smaller scale.
- I felt my influence through Hive, noticing changes to the ecosystem and to individuals behavior that may have been partially thanks to me and my actions.
- I learned to see myself and the world more objectively because the process of self-examination was so natural while blogging every day, and balancing between grind and inspiration helped me to learn more about myself.
- I made a bunch of friends around the world that I can visit as soon as I am able.
- I learned to prioritize my creativity over my politics. I may have things I want to say and I can say them, but I don't need to waste my energy debating because my art is much more powerful.
- I stopped paying attention to how much I was earning and learned to prioritize the overal experience of sharing and getting feedback.
I hope this post pushed all the right buttons, we all know Hive related posts are an easy way to get lots of upvotes, so let's see if this goes trending, couldn't pass up the chance :-P BUT SERIOUSLY, I love this place, despite all it's problems, and I am happy to still be here and still growing with all of you.
I hope I'm here 6 years later and if things keep playing out on their current trajectory, I likely will be.
If you know me and like me and want to be friends with me and my friends or if you want to have chats about "deep shit" and "cross culture", you should join the Be Awesome discord channel. Not for post-promo, it's a place to really connect and get to know each other more. Thanks to 
Massive thanks to 
I want to tag a lot more people, but I kind of find tagging multiple people in one post obnoxious and I'm wayyy past my quota already, so thanks to all the curation groups and communities and friends I didn't name that made me feel welcome here.
I love you all, here is to 6 more years.
🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒🐒
My Other Work:
Novel series:
Confessions of the Damaged - psychedelic novella series
Untangled Knots Podcast:
Merch/Support links etc.
Latest vlog:
How I surrounded myself with wonderful people
Music:
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