Five Tiny (But Critical) Things I Wish I Knew When Making Less than $1 Writing On The Internet

Avoid these traps on your way to internet success

Photo by Microsoft 365 on Unsplash

In February 2018, I made a whopping total of $1.30 on Medium.

Last year, I made more than $1,000 (AUD) multiple times.

I didn’t start writing for the money, but reaching the four-figure milestone felt massive.

The money:

• Covered almost 50% of my mortgage (that’s cool).

• Combined with my savings, this income could allow me to live as a digital nomad in Thailand (that’s even cooler).

• Validated my theory that I could make it as a creative entrepreneur (most important).

This feeling of freedom is priceless.

Just knowing that if my consulting business failed, or anything went wrong in my life, I always had an escape hatch. I had options to choose from and choices that most people don’t have.

I know I will never have to struggle to find a 9–5 job. This money creates a new baseline and runway to pivot if needed. Every year that baseline becomes higher and the runway becomes longer.

I stumbled and failed my way through this point. I want to tell you everything you might need to know to go from $1 to $1,000 per month.

This must be a first priority.

The first year of writing online is going to be rough.

Like really rough.

You’ll spend hours and hours crafting an article or blog post, only for a handful of people to read it, let alone engage with it.

The truth is that your first 50 (or 100) articles will probably suck.

Mine did. They probably still suck now depending on who you ask.

When your initial burst of motivation wears off, and the reality of creating online starts to sink in, could you still show up every day?

That’s why you need to have an intrinsic joy to write online.

I love the process of having an idea, researching it, pulling it apart, and putting it together.

I can become consumed by an idea for an article for days or weeks at a time. I start to obsess about how I can write it in a way that is relatable and refreshing to my audience.

I find it therapeutic when putting my thoughts out there. I write to become a better thinker and speaker.

When I don’t write for a couple of days, I feel like I am holding in a sneeze. Something needs to come out.

Intrinsic joy keeps me coming back day after day. I learn to ignore the outcome (views, money, etc) and just focus on the process.

Prioritize your enjoyment. Everything else will come later.

Don’t chase fast.

Ironically, chasing fast is the slowest way to grow.

When you look for shortcuts and ‘hacks’ to grow, you end up wasting your time with people wanting to turn a quick buck off you.

Making progress in any domain is about compounding. Compounding skills, knowledge and capital.

But the trick to compounding is that the greatest rewards come at the tail end. This is why so few people ever make use of the power of compounding.

When you look at most of the successful people on Medium or any other platform, have usually been creating for years. In some cases decades.

Many have written about how they toiled away in obscurity for years before gaining any sort of traction or audience.

Play the game consistently for five years and you’ll virtually guarantee your success.

You’re only limited by one thing.

Your mindset.

A lack of a growth mindset will kill more writing dreams than a lack of talent ever will.

Does talent matter? Of course.

But if an untalented hack who got below average for English in high school (me) can consistently make $1,000 per month and attract tens of thousands of views, you can too.

I don’t believe I am the best. But I do believe that I can get better.

Once you’ve got the right mindset, it becomes easier to upgrade your skills.

There is a number of courses you can take, articles you can read and people that can coach you.

Sounds cliche as hell, but your mindset is everything.

Small is slow. And slow is fast.

Make your writing into a small daily practice.

Get what Tim Ferriss calls your “250 shitty words on a page” every day.

No judgment. Just show up. Write. Close the laptop screen. Show up again the next day. Repeat indefinitely.

String together enough of these days and before you know it, you’re producing 2–3 articles per week.

Starting small is not compromising your goals. It’s about building momentum.

Just like you don’t begin training for a marathon by running the full amount, you need to slowly condition your body and brain to write every day.

The journey of 1,000 steps is won by taking the first one.

Making small progress can feel incredibly slow, until one day it’s not.

Once you have built enough momentum, you’ll find that your small actions produce disproportionate results.

Momentum gets you started. Leverage takes you to the next level. And compounding makes your results exponential.

You’ll never feel like you’ve arrived

When I started, I imagined that I would reach a point where I would be writing in blissful harmony.

Every word that I wrote would be gold. My feelings of insecurity and imposter syndrome would disappear and I will build a loyal following of readers who would love everything I wrote.

But this feeling of ‘arriving’ never happens. I’ve spoken to successful writers who have been in the game for decades and they still get nervous, fearful and unsure of how people will receive their work.

That’s what makes writing so beautiful. It’s a deeply emotional act. If it weren’t emotional, we might as well crank out articles written by ChatGPT.

Let go of the feeling of arriving at a destination.

The joy comes from the journey.

Remember that a man who loves walking will walk farther than a man who loves the destination.

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