My Hive Story - I Give In

I've been seeing posts with this title for days now and I said I'm not going to do it as I have told my Hive story several times but today I opened @themarkymark's post and saw there are specific questions started by @snook here and it may actually be fun. So here I am, sharing my Hive story with whoever is willing to read it.

How long have you been on the Blockchain?

Hiveblocks says 52 moons, and I believe it, it was 20th of January 2018 when I registered. Jesus, that's almost 4 years already!

What was your background in Cryptocurrency when you first came to the blockchain?

Not much, I knew about crypto, have been reading about it but that was all.

What was your background in writing when you first came to the blockchain?

I had a cooking blog in Hungarian, so writing was not a problem but writing in English was. Basically when I registered my intention was to practice English. I remember at first I was terrified to publish a post and my posts were very short, mostly contained photos and a couple of sentences. It took me some time to get used to publishing longer posts.

How many people did you know when you first came to the Blockchain?

Quite a lot actually and I may be part of the exception here. Most of the users knew one person or two when they registered and I can't even begin to imagine how hard must have been for them to get followers.

Prior to registering to Hive, I've been on TSU, a social media platform that went dark one night. I had a lot of friends there. When I registered to Hive, the first thing I did was look up all my old friends and in an hour or so I had more than 18 followers already and got more the next few days. This helped me a lot as I had people to turn to in case I didn't know something (lol, I didn't know anything about how things work, so you can imagine) and also had support, which is not something to neglect. I will never forget when @melinda010100 gave me a tip of $1.23. She said they have to make the blockchain attractive to new users. I knew her from TSU and can't tell you how big of a surprise it was.

How did you meet people when you first came to the Blockchain?

For me meeting people wasn't so difficult. Having a lot of friends already from day one gave me the opportunity to comment on their posts and meet new people, connect with them.

Who did you look up to when you first came to the blockchain?

This is a difficult one as I can't name only one person. I looked up to those who were here before me and were already successful so to speak. I knew they know more than me which made me look up to them. Only later I have realized that not everyone is a good example here and you have to choose carefully who to follow and who to learn from.

I remember a post I saw in Trending right at the beginning. I was sooooo green, I knew nothing about the tokenomics and this post said the guy took a huge risk as he spend a lot of STEEM on his post and he was keeping his fingers crossed, hoping his investment would pay out. I thought wow, such a courageous guy, to find out in a week or two that he was basically using bid bots to boost his earnings and we all know what was the story with bid bots. It was a good lesson for me as I have never used bid bots.

How would you describe your first three months on the blockchain?

If I could choose three words, those would be LEARNING, LEARNING, LEARNING! The first week was extremely difficult, till I could understand the difference between SP, SBD and STEEM, plus managing VP and all the new things. After one week I started having bandwidth problems due to low stake. What a shock it was.

Now looking back after almost 4 years I'd say that was nothing, compared to what we have now, with all the tribe tokens, communities, exchanges and all. To me it was all new and have learned a lot in the first three months as that was the only way to move forward.

Has being a part of the blockchain changed you in any way for the good?

It has changed me in a lot of ways actually, for the good obviously. I remember reading posts about all kinds of things, art, travel, cooking you name it. I had an old friend from TSU, @barbara-orenya, a true artist with a style that has always fascinated me. I was reading her posts, every single one, trying to learn from her tutorials, to finally take the courage and start drawing.

I can't even begin to tell you how much fun I had with each and every drawing I have created over the years. Having no talent at all made it easy as I had no expectations at all. I just had fun drawing and then posting my drawings. Over the years I have improved a little and I'd like to resume drawing once I have more time.

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There was this dog I like a lot, even though I see the mistakes I made.

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This drawing was one of my best work, as bad as it is 😂

Then reading all those needlework posts, one day I took the courage to start learning sewing. Long story short, I have opened my Etsy store and am now selling bags, mostly for customers from the US.

This is the latest one I shipped to the US last month.

I've managed to grow my account and created a safety blanket in case I need some funds and invested in different projects, all thanks to being part of the blockchain.

What is your favorite memory from your time on the blockchain?

I have so many I don't know which one to pick honestly. If you're here every single day for four years (almost) and you're engaging with the community, not just dropping your posts, there are so many good memories you have. And bad too but let's not talk about those now 😃

If you could give advice to a new person signing up to Hive what would it be?

I could write a book full of advice but if I were to limit myself to the most important I'd say don't look at this blockchain as your ATM. This place can give you the opportunity to change your life forever as it did with so many of us.

Choose the right way, be honest, respect the rules, be consistent and don't just focus on the rewards. There are so many things you can learn here, it's more than earning a few $$.

Try to engage, be part of communities, contribute in any way you can, if you have skills join projects and help in building this place. It is our home after all, our future.