How To Fail At Medium

And How To Come Back From It

I’m not new here even if my follower count looks like it. I’ve been here before. And for a while, I was really enjoying myself. But metric lust, algorithmic overthinking, self-fluffed ego, and rigid ethical boundaries led to me leaving the site in a fiery hellstorm earlier this year. Don’t get me wrong, there’s not a lot that I regret. But just because I don’t regret it doesn’t mean it wasn’t wholly unnecessary.

I didn’t think I would return. My plan was to put all of my efforts into my personal site, my multi-author blog off-platform, and my podcasts. But my plan didn’t work. I wouldn’t call it a colossal miscalculation coupled with life happenstance, but it was a mild clusterf*ck at best. I failed. First, I failed at Medium. Then I failed off of Medium.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.“ — Winston Churchill

One of my redeeming traits is that I don’t feel shame. I genuinely don’t give a crap about most of the minutia of life. It comes, it goes. It stays, it leaves. I just focus on my kids, my health, and my mental well-being and the rest is just kind of there. So my fall off the side of the Medium cliff was just that — a fall. I got up, dusted myself off, and did other stuff.

The problem was it was harder. On my own site, there were no claps, few comments, and a mailing list as paltry as the line to get a salad at WWE Raw. Yes, that bad. I tried, but life also intervened. And in that regard, maybe it was all for the best. The timing was good for me to step away.

I mean, it would have been cool if I still had the 4.2k followers that I had when I left, but I can only blame myself for walking off like an arsonist into the sunset after dropping a match to my account. Lit. On. Fire.

This isn’t about why I came back. That is rather simple. I’m a better writer when I’m here. And I feel better about my writing when I’m here. Period. I don’t have a condo in Jupiter, Florida to sell you. Or some swampland. I don’t have a new job hocking encyclopedias. I don’t even care about my mailing lists. They are too hard to maintain and if I hate every email I get, I’m sure my emails weren’t much better.

This is about how to fail at Medium. And how I failed. The things that I let get to me that led me down a boisterous cycle of alarm and dog crying. I wasn’t my best self, but I was a good writer. I was a good publisher. I was a good Medium participant in a lot of ways. But in a lot of ways, I was a black sheep. And I earned the f*ck out of that, in a bad way.

Metric Lust

I had it. You probably have it too, even if you think you don’t. But this is about me. And my failure. And my lustful intoxication with the statistical side of writing. Just think of those words — the statistical side of writing. Sounds ridiculous, right? It is ridiculous, but it is also very real.

Our number obsession isn’t going anywhere and neither are the bells and whistles that tell us every time we get a pat on the back or a slow graze across the navel. Those bips and bops are the slot machines that make us drink ourselves silly on free gin and tonics while hitting on 17 because we were feeling it at 3:47 a.m. at the blackjack table.

We lust after our numbers like teenagers at a spin-the-bottle party. I mean, I did. I would refresh my stats page a million times a day. And when things were rolling for me, it was hot. I was getting psychologically aroused by my numbers. And that is f*cking weird.

Metric lust was the first thing that put my foot into the eventual rabbit hole that I couldn’t climb out of. Because when your numbers are flowing like Cristal at a T-Pain Christmas party, you are all about yourself. And then one day, one story tanks and now Medium is a piece of sh*t. It doesn’t work. The algorithm is broken. All because I wrote a bad story. Chances are it was just a bad story. But I couldn’t see it because my numbers had me perpetually hopped up like a mouthful of Pop Rocks and Coke.

Don’t get metric lust. It’s Viagra for your screen. Not. A. Good. Combo.

Algorithmic Overthinking

Oh my God, shut up. I am talking to myself. I wrote so many sentences about Medium’s algorithm last year. So. Many. I was writing stories and snarky comments about “a process or set of rules to be followed in calculations or other problem-solving operations, especially by a computer.” What the f*ck was wrong with me? I was suffering from algorithmic overthinking. You too?

I would try to figure out how it worked and the second I thought I got it, it would change. But that’s not really what happened. I don’t know what happened. Neither do you. You never will. Neither will I. It’s that simple. Why worry about how bad something is working when you have absolutely no control over it and don’t even understand it.

What happens when someone tries to explain a specific site’s algorithm to you? If you are like me, you start listening and then the music starts playing in your mind and you are gone. It’s Trig class when the hottest person in school sits next to you. Your eyes are open, you are listening, but you can’t see or hear anything. It’s all mumbo jumbo.

Overthinking is always a subtle death bed in all aspects of our lives and this was no different for me. It was another weight on my back during the plunge into the rabbit hole that I would never climb out of.

It’s a computer program. You will never understand it. You can’t quantify it. It won’t work the same every day. Don’t get caught in a spiral of algorithmic overthinking. It doesn’t matter. You can only control what you publish. That’s it. Focus on that.

Self-Fluffed Ego

A lot of times our ego is built off the backs of other people’s kind comments about us. And sure, there was some of that. Most people on Medium are very kind and the more I wrote, the more compliments I received. It made my ego feel good. Steady. But it wasn’t that which started my long and rocky descent to the bottom of the rabbit hole. It was me.

I was fanning my own flames. I didn’t need a fluffer, I was doing fine on my own. I was just caught up in the twister of self-importance and unrealistic expectations. I thought I knew better than everyone. Including Medium. But again, don’t get me wrong, a lot of the stuff I wrote was valid. It was researched and quantifiable, solid. But it was so unnecessary.

When you start rambling on about useless stuff on a platform that you are doing well on, you have to take a look in the mirror. I didn’t. I just kept patting myself on the back for my numbers. My publications. My meaningless Top Writer nods. I tweeted out everything, when I still had Twitter, and it was all about my self-fluffed ego.

The other side of the coin though is this. Only a confident person with a sizeable ego could write this. You have to have some extra fluff in the tank to pwn yourself like this openly. But I think it’s necessary. It feels like an elephant in the Medium cyber-room to me. And it’s felt like that in emails and comments and private notes since I returned. So, here it is.

My Medium ego got picked up so high I could barely get my head through a regular door. And that is directly on me. And it didn’t help me grow. It helped me fail. Because on a site like this, we are all in the same boat. If we aren’t a celebrity stopping by to plug a book, we are identical. Some with more followers. Some with less. But pretty much the same. Writing words. Hoping they resonate with someone. At least, that’s our best self.

Don’t fluff your ego. It’s not a good look. Get a partner to do that. Or a friend. Don’t be a self-fluffer. It won’t help you. It didn’t help me.

Rigid Ethical Boundaries

I thought I left my rigidity in the past, but I didn’t. It always seems to rear its devil-baby head and collapse something good for me. I really just can’t help myself. I am like an injustice magnet. I want to find it and expose it. I want to blow that f*cking whistle over and over and over. I know. Eye rolling too.

Who the f*ck am I? Who was I? No one. Nobody on a website. With words. Seen on a computer. In different rooms, states, countries. Or inside a computer simulation. Either way, while I am glad I have a voice and the freedom to speak it, I really needed to just shut the f*ck up.

Were my points well taken? Yeah, most of the time they were. But what was my end game? Flagellate Medium in a story and then get crowned the Mayor of Stumptown? It made no sense. Because it was based on my own personal rigid ethical boundaries.

This is the right way. This is wrong. You shouldn’t do this. This is ok, but not preferred. Shut. The. F*ck. Up. Let people do what they want. Don’t read it. Don’t clap. Don’t snap them in the comments. Just let them fade away or succeed. It won’t change anything for you. Ahem, for me. I’m talking to myself again.

Throw away your attraction to ethical regulations as it relates to Medium. It’s their site. We just type words on it and get paid. Throw rigidity out the window. It’s an open platform. Allow it.

What I Threw Away

The positive version: nothing I can’t get back. The negative version: people, respect, growth. And for what? I really did need the break, but why was I so determined to burn the house down, delete my publications which I loved, and rain fire and brimstone down on my readers? All the reasons above are why.

We all get caught up in ourselves online these days, but when the rubber met the road I chose to come back to a place I made a fiery exit from. With no subterfuge. I threw it all into a can in the corner of the room. Then I went to see if it was still there. And the can was there, but nothing that I wrote was. And it’s better that way.

I have all my stories. Some went to my site. Some went to the graveyard where they wholeheartedly belong. I lost 4.2k followers. Big whoop. Most of my friends are still here and they are still my friends. So, in the end, did I really lose anything?

If the journey is the important part then I didn’t throw anything away. But I know I did. I just don’t think it matters as much as you think. This is a new challenge. Let me see how it works now. Let me see how much more transparent I can be. Let me see how I can resist the temptation to go negative.

Maybe this is how it was supposed to happen. I threw it away so I could do it again, the right way. Without listicles. And a headline analyzer. With more poetry. Because I like to write it. I don’t care if four people read it. It felt good when I wrote it in a notebook. That’s the end-game.

All I threw away were words. And numbers. And ego. And I can get that all back. But if I don’t care if I do or not, maybe it will be a more pleasurable ride this time.

People Are What Matter

Our words are great. But our goal is for them to resonate with people. Our numbers are pretty to look at when they are dressed up all nice, but those numbers are people. People clap. People comment. People share. People are what matter.

These people I owe a deep debt of gratitude to. Because while I burned my Medium house down to the ground, they stayed with me. Or they were right here for me when I came back. Welcoming me back with open arms. So, thank you to Jeff Barton, Bonnie Barton, Daria Krauzo, Heather Wargo, Dave Roberts, Vanessa Torre, Kitty Hannah Eden, George J. Ziogas, Danny Forest, Michelle Elizabeth, Iva Ursano, Pamela J. Nikodem, MS, Stacy (Wurz) Alamond, Leah Kim, Niki Marinis, P.S. I Love You.

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