Steemit freewrite; leveling up and voting down!

Good morning, Steemit! This could potentially turn out to be a second post kind of day. My photography and art posts are usually made after midnight. This morning, for reasons I can’t fully understand, I woke up wide awake at 6:00a.m. I feel full rested, which is bizarre knowing that I only slept 4.5 hours. I’m sure there’s an afternoon crash coming, but thus far I made @guthrie and @vermillionfox breakfast, packed his lunch, got him to school and did dishes. I usually leave the house in the morning because as a freelancer, I lack discipline to not go back to sleep. I started writing this to keep the momentum towards productivity.

This is just a freewrite. I’m not sure what I’m going to say. Accompanying my suspiciously early morning, I’ve feeling a bit manic. I’m thinking about a lot right now. Life in general, society and it’s current state of decline, my career, several stories of fiction I’m developing, Steemit […of course]. It’s a lot to parse. I wrote a blog several months ago titled, “$11,000 Bitcoin freewrite!”. You should read it, if you haven’t. In it, I outline how $8 STEEM managed to cross my state of mind to a very lucid reality of self actualization. Sadly, $0.12 STEEM means I’m in financial pains but my brain is more actualized than ever.

I’m going to stick with Steemit because it’s nearest and dearest to my heart. HF22 and downvotes are a touchy subject right now. There’s a learning curve looking at a downvote as a “good thing”. I imagine some downvoting will be punitive, but it’s a necessary evolution of this social experiment. I do really well here on Steemit and I’m grateful for the support I get and the friendships I’ve made. I’m proud of my content and consistency over the last 3+ years and the rewards, although attenuated by STEEM price, are only part of why I sit here to write and contribute each day.

Earlier this morning, I had exchange with @pharesim on voting practices. I never really thought of my habits as vote trading, because anyone I hit with a 100% vote, I feel does deserve it. I’m sort of a Steemit purist in the sense that I think of this as a long form platform. I love seeing development on the STEEM blockchain with dApps like @appics, but if I don’t personally feel the post itself or the art/writing/music/video therein took over an hour of your time, I’m usually reluctant to give a 100% vote.

In my conversation with @pharesim, though, I realized that I’ve lost an essential part of my earlier voting practices and that is seeking out new artists in the community. Having the morning to think about it, I’ve concluded that the diminished authorship, relatively at least to Steemit’s all time high […at one point we were ranked in the 900’s of global Alexa listings], is in part why I began voting on the same accounts. There was a time not long ago, when it seemed like the only creators publishing work were the same usual suspects.

I relied on friends like @eveuncovered, @acidyo, @veryspider, @scrawly and a few others to introduce me to new artists via resteems. I’m going to start wading in to the Steemit rabbit hole again, like I used to during late nights in bed, scanning the “New” category of art and photography tags. I think I needed to be called out for some uninspired voting habits and I’m encouraged that there’s accountability on Steemit that can be handled constructively without the drama. Starting today, my curation will return to finding new artists and creators, in addition to voting on the folks that’ve held the line all these years. I’d love suggestions. 

Also, on the subject of Steemit, I just bumped up to a (73). I’m real fucking happy about that. I see some accounts hitting (80) and that’s insane to me, but (73) seemed impossible once upon a time. It wasn’t until recently that I was included on some of the curation trails, so even to get here was a slow road. Now, though, “…people know me. I’m very important.” […I will reference this every time I level up in reputation, so deal with it. That’s my freewrite. I’m going to try and get some writing done on my horror story, Thanks for reading and letting me rant.