My Impatience for 100 Followers is All Wrong

I came here to write. Period.

I’ve always been an impatient person. Delayed gratification is just not in my repertoire. Sounds familiar?

I joined Medium a week ago. The reason is that I recently launched a new website and blog. I knew the reality was that I would probably get next to no readers on my website, at least for the foreseeable future, so why not cross-post to Medium?

When I found out about the Partner Program, I got derailed. The competitive achiever in me saw a goal post and zeroed in on how to get it. This arbitrary 100 follower metric became my new target and I started to obsess over it. I began devouring articles about how to get there.

I woke up today realizing that I’m motivated by the wrong reasons. I had to be honest with myself… is the 100 followers actually what I want to focus on? It’s not even why I joined Medium in the first place. I didn’t know you could make money doing this sort of thing. So I gave myself an internal slap and asked a really important question:

Why am I on Medium?

The reason I’m here is to write for women. We go through unique experiences in this modern world trying to juggle it all. And it’s hard. It’s hard being an entrepreneur and mother and partner and house cleaner and chef and family member and friend AT THE SAME TIME. I even started a publication on it called Modern Women.

I want to share my experiences for two reasons:

1. My own catharsis — I need an outlet to vent, share and laugh about my own experiences. I can’t keep sharing it all with my partner or he will literally go crazy, as he’s told me and I agree with.
2. To hopefully help another — We all gain something when we read a piece we relate to. I gain as a writer because I feel like my writing matters and you gain as a reader by bringing insight to your life.

Letting it all go

In the spirit of this newfound realization, I am making the following commitments to myself:

• Write, write, write — because that’s what I came here to do
• Follow people I’m actually interested in, not every person I come across
• Connect with people because that’s what really matters
• Grow the new Modern Women publication because it’s something I really believe in

Now that I’m back on track, it’s time to get writing!

With love, Megan