Not giving up on Steemit just yet. I'm back, and here is why

28 days

It's been 28 days since my last post. That's a long time.

I had my reasons for being away for a while. It started with that hardfork 20 situation. Everything I thought I knew about how Steem works seemed to go upside down. It felt like I had to start from scratch in finding out how to post and comment and upvote smartly. And that finding out how it all works now would again take me so much time and effort.

Office hours

The other thing is that recently, I started a fulltime job. A new job, like any of the major life changes we go through, requires attention and energy. And when a core part of our day to day life changes, we need a bit of time for the other parts of day to day life to settle. At least I do.

But as I'm two months into the new job, which is by the way a lot of fun and gives me amazing opportunity to learn and grow, I start feeling that access energy for creating and building something that's a project of my own and that I'm passionate about. As many people here on this platform, I'm a true believer in being financially independent. Running my own projects in such a way that I don't have to depend on someone else providing me a salary.

Cute coffee place in The Hague where my husband and I had a nice chat about work, life and the projects we want to pick up (again)

Financially independent vs working for a boss

There's something about working for a boss that sits weird with me. The reward system just doesn't seem right - being payed a monthly salary, whether I do amazing work and add to the company's profit, or not. I like using the world as my mirror: setting goals and seeing how I am successful in achieving those goals tells me so much about who I am and how I can grow as a person. Being your own boss requires a level of honesty with yourself and how your actions are getting you where you want to be, that is not naturally present in the context of being payed a monthly salary for projects which, if you excel in them, will make your boss more rich.

My new job has a lot of perks. I get to work in a fun team, on projects which are new to me and provide me with a lot of opportunity to learn. Being payed a monthly salary makes me (and my husband) a more reliable partner for the bank when we approach them for a loan. And in general, since I really like going to the office and doing the things I do every day, it's also a meaningful way to spend my time. But even if I spend 40 hour of my week there, I still feel that big urge to work on projects that are my own, to put time and energy towards that which will make me financially independent over time.

Some projects of my own

So what are my options? When I talked about getting a loan from the bank, that would be for our project of investing in real estate. Buying homes and renovating them, renting them out to cover the mortgage expenses and have extra income, enjoying the appreciation they make over time (means we'll have to buy smart of course) and in maybe 30 years, have a property where the mortgage is payed off and which we can either sell if we need the money at that time or hold for more monthly income. But, even though we now have the financial situation to easily get a loan for buying a next house, the house prices are soaring high at the moment and we'll (probably) have to wait for the market to turn to be able to buy smart.

Another effort into creating financial freedom is investing in commodities. Gold and silver mostly, as we are expecting the markets to turn soon (or to continue to turn, as it seems things are already on the move).

Isn't this a very contemplative look?

Timing

So the real estate plan is on hold for a bit, due to market timing. Once the time is right, next real estate projects is what I love to work on, which also require a lot of smart thinking, smart action and creativity from our sides. Investing in commodities is something we have already done and when more money gets freed up, we might do more. But apart from keeping an eye on what the markets are doing, not a lot of action is required on our side to keep that up. As I said, after two months at the new job I'm now at the point where I have energy for my own projects, and I want to put my efforts into creating something. As I'm expecting a bear market for some time, this might be a tough time for business ideas. Unless they are ideas for things which people turn to in economically difficult times. Anything requiring people to spend extra money might not be easy to start with right now.

What else?

When the regular markets go down, what other investments might people turn to? Yes, commodities. But also: crypto's!!!

Of the projects I've been picking up, which requires my smart thinking, smart acting and creativity? Steemit blogging!!!

So sure, after HF20, I'm kind of at a loss what to do here, how to make my posts noticed. Having little response on my latest tries didn't really help. But this is a platform where I have to grow and expand myself to understand how to make this work, how to get people's attention, how to behave in such a way that I can grow my account. So I'm sticking around here, even if it is just because this is a place where I am my own boss and where I face the consequences of my actions myself.

And of course - Steemit is the answer!

Happy to be back. Thanks to everyone making this platform what it is.