Summary

The author reflects on their journey with writing on Medium, detailing their top 5 most successful stories in terms of earnings and reader engagement, while emphasizing personal growth and the power of honest, resonant storytelling.

Abstract

The author has been writing on Medium since 2016 but experienced a significant upturn in productivity and success following a period of personal development that began in 2020. After being fired from a marketing job in 2021, the author started to write more consistently, leading to improved statistics on the platform. The author shares their most successful Medium stories, including one about the impact of changing beverage consumption habits, another about understanding social struggles and an autism diagnosis, and a piece on Polyvagal Theory for anxiety relief. These stories have earned varying amounts, with the most popular article earning $516.74 as of the writing date. The author expresses a mission to share life lessons to help others, highlighting the importance of authenticity in writing and the positive reception of their most honest and practical work.

Opinions

The author has a distaste for the trend of Medium stories that focus on the earnings and success of the writer, finding it distasteful and referring to it as "ick."
There is a belief that personal empowerment is a key factor in the success of their writing, as evidenced by the popularity of their most honest and practical stories.
The author values transparency in success and failure, preferring to share both to help others learn from their experiences.
They express pride and a sense of accomplishment in their writing, particularly in the stories that have resonated with readers and helped them earn money.
The author advocates for the benefits of changing lifestyle habits, such as reducing coffee and alcohol intake, based on personal experience with improved health and well-being.
There is a strong conviction that authentic storytelling, which includes being open about personal struggles, can be the most rewarding for both the writer and the audience.

My Top 5 Medium Stories

…And what they’ve earned

I’ve been writing on Medium for a while — since 2016. But I was deep, deep in my mental illness at that point, and quite literally could not get myself together enough to write very often (if ever). Maybe you’re reading these words thinking, “damn, that sounds like me.” If you are, then my darling, know that you can be in a much better place in your life, but you’ll have to work at it.

In 2020, I began what I think of as my personal renaissance of self-development, In 2021 I was fired from my full-time marketing job, and in 2022 I started showing up as what I consider my “best self.” Sometimes we can only do our best work when we’re forced to do it without a net.

That’s also when I started to write consistently on Medium, and it’s definitely reflected in my stats.

“Look What I Earned!” = ick

There’s a niche that does quite well on Medium, and it consists of stories about how well one has done writing on Medium, and how “you can too!” That’s all well and good, but it feels kind of “ick” to me, so I’ve never written one — until now.

I want to be transparent about my successes as well as my misses (notice I didn’t say failures!). That’s a big part of my mission in life — sharing what I’ve been through and what I’ve learned so that others may suffer a little less.

Screenshot of the author’s stats, taken by author on 1/7/24

Empowerment FTW

It’s been wonderful to see that my most-read, highest-earning stories have been a few of the most honest — and some of the most practical.

My third most popular story, Livin’ La Vida Lorem Ispum, came out in August and has earned $124.82 since then (as of this writing). I was so chuffed when I named that story (I felt clever), and had a feeling that anyone who had ever worked with dummy text would at least give it a look. The story focuses on my work in the marketing industry, and how dirty it made me feel. That seemed to resonate with a lot of people.

At number 5 among my highest-earning Medium stories of all time is Change Your Algorithm, Change Your Life, and it’s earned a relatively meager $44.64 since it came out in January. I was inspired to write that by a story I read here on Medium. The author was a young man bemoaning the fact that he “can’t go on social media” because “all it shows him” are gorgeous young half-naked women. That made me laugh because all social media “shows me” is uplifting content. Which goes to show that life shows you what you’re looking for.

My fourth highest-earning Medium story is dear to my heart. An Introduction to Polyvagal Theory of Anxiety Relief shares the basics of an understanding that utterly changed my life. If I’d known how utterly dysregulated my nervous system was all my life, I could have saved myself decades of pain. But alas, it is, as they say, what it is. That story’s earned $52.66, and I truly think it could help people heal if only they’d read it!

My Second Highest Earning Story

December 15, 2022 was my 50th birthday. It was also the day that my second highest-earning Medium story of all time came out.

How Adjusting My Beverage Consumption Changed my Life was my (rather bewildered) report on the remarkable changes that came about in my life as a result of having done two things that I’d thought would be impossible for me to do: stop drinking coffee entirely and cut way back on booze. I say “bewildered” because, having been a daily drinker of both coffee and wine for decades, I don’t think I’d grokked how ill they’d both made me. Feeling good was still odd to me at the point I wrote that article.

I truly can’t recommend both those changes enough. I’ve even written an eBook about succeeding at Dry January. At 51, I’ve never felt as healthy as I do now. So far, this story has earned $315.79.

People Love My Story About Why People Don’t Like Me

My most popular Medium article (by far) came out on June 15, 2023, and it’s earned $516.74 to date.

It’s called I Understand Why People Have Never Liked Me and it’s about why I’ve always struggled socially, and about how I was eventually diagnosed as autistic. I love this story, and am thrilled that it resonates with people.

If there’s any takeaway from this article, other than the chance to peek at someone’s earnings, it’s this: peeling your skin back in your writing so that your readers can see what your inner life consists of can be the most rewarding form of writing.