My journey in the featured edition contest has been amazing. I joined the contest in March last year around the 50th week of the contest. I had been on hive for a year prior to that time.
I remember reading some nice blogs and at the end of each of the blogs, I would see tags such as #hl-exclusive and the likes. I began to wonder what the tags were about. With time, I began to know more about the hive learners community and by extension the Featured Editions.
The quality contents about people's experience in life drew me in. After a few months of reading contents from the community, I found my way to the discord server and that's the beginning of my purposeful journey in the community.
Immediately I was verified as a member, I started to participate in the Featured Editions. I handle my participation in the contest the way I handle my activities on web2. I didn't take engagement seriously. Before joining the Featured Editions, I was only writing fictional stories and I was fond of dropping a post and revisiting it two or more days later to reply to some of the comments. I hardly comment on other people's posts. All these changed when I started participating in the Featured Editions. I discovered the importance of engagement practically. The moderator several times replied to my content with a message that encouraged me to interact. That lesson has remained valuable to me. My growth in the blockchain through engaging with other people has been fascinating.
Another lesson that I learned from the Featured Editions is to keep an open mind while reading the blogs of other people. The necessity of learning, relearning and unlearning as the case may warrant became glaring to me. I read with an open mind and this has helped me to shape my thought process to be a better version of myself.
I have also learned to respect rules and regulations of any community that I belong to. The moderators are doing a good job in keeping every member on track. You mustn't just come to the contest to earn the crypto, you should be there to serve as a catalyst of growth to the community in general. This particular lesson has made me willing to participate in any activity of the community that would spur the growth of the community.
In the past year that I have been participating in the Featured Editions, my writing has improved exponentially. I wasn't good at writing nonfiction before I started participating in the Featured Editions. Though I am far from being perfect in my writing, I have convincingly moved steps ahead from where I was before finding this community and contest. This is a great achievement of inestimable value to me.
In addition to this, the Featured Edition has helped me to grow my list of followers. The joy of every author is to have your work being read by others. I make many friends who are now instrumental to my continuous growth through their support.
The misconception that I had about the Featured Edition contest is the conclusion in my early stage of joining that the support of the moderators is for old established members. At one point, I thought that it wouldn't be easy to be recognized in the community as a new member. As the time went by, I realized that I was wrong. I discovered that what you need to get recognized is writing quality content and staying for the community in the form of engagements and participating in other activities. I found out that all I needed to do was to join the community wholeheartedly. I did that and that and the growth that I witnessed became tremendous. I found out that what was required of me was to improve on the quality of my posts and stay for the community.
Through this experience, my misconception was quashed. It became clear to me that a newcomer could find his feet in the Featured Editions almost immediately. It's all dependent on the level of dedication and patience to see things take proper shape.
I will round up this piece by appreciating the moderators who have been walking round the clock to keep the contest running consistently. You guys deserve gold 🏅. Cheers for a fulfilled 100 weeks.
I hopeto dedicate myself even more to the success of another 100 weeks.