The number of notes on my highest-noted therapist post is very close to the total number of dollars I owe in student loans for my MSW. This makes me understand why people go crazy trying to monetize their audiences, because people inevitably start thinking, "If I could get everybody who liked that post to give me a dollar, I could pay for [blank]" -- which inevitably morphs into the current Substack model of "maybe I can get a smaller number of them to give me $5 a month."
I have not been able to successfully monetize my writing since I had an opinion column at my college newspaper. I have tried a number of different ways. I think I've made a total of like $500 from writing as an adult, which is more than a lot of people ever make from writing, but which does not pay the bills. I simply have never been able to write on a consistent enough schedule to meet publication deadlines or satisfy a subscriber audience who very reasonably expects to receive what they paid for. This is one of the many things in my life that might be different if my body could tolerate ADHD medication. But alas.
