Why I've Made Substack My Home (For Now)
It took 11 years to get here.
I know that any Substacker will appreciate this post, but I secretly hope it finds:
Writers and artists of all kinds looking for a home for their platform. Substack has multimedia capabilities and so this is quite a broad brushstroke of individuals.
Those of you who are tired of mainstream social media.
Readers.
If you fit any of this criteria, keep reading.
I first began sharing Metanoia (the platform) on Wordpress in 2015. It was expensive, hard to navigate, and mostly empty with the exception of an annoying online stalker and a thriving community of fundamentalist Christians. I started writing Metanoia in my freshman year of college, and I wanted to begin developing a readership whilst having a place to share my thoughts and reflections. I quickly found out that in order to reach anybody at all, I would have to spend a lot of money and time I didn’t have, and to reduce myself to a brand. The biggest hurdle of all, however, was the lack of interest in written media. So, I took my thoughts over to Youtube, a modality that never has been nor will be natural to me, just so that I didn’t have to purchase an audience.
This was the right move. At the time, tools of divination had just become mainstream, and I was a numerologist that used her practice to help write her work of fiction. I leaned into that, and found a small community of people who, to my surprise, enjoyed my silly videos and what I had to say in the realm of consciousness and spirituality. That was my focus for many years, making slow progress on Metanoia while sharing my reflections and numerology practice as I went along.
But then something strange happened over the course of several years. I easily made it to 1k subscribers, and then all of a sudden my stats came to a halt despite not doing anything differently. I began to witness the dark underbelly of Youtube, which is just big brother Google, quietly silence several channels including my own, without any reason except that we weren’t chasing trends, we weren’t selling garbage media to the public, and we were talking about real things. This was especially apparent in 2020, when the BLM movement and COVID was running hot and social media companies took it upon themselves to censor content talking about current events. Several of my subscribers said they stopped seeing my videos in their feed despite being subscribed, and I also saw views plummet on other channels adjacent to mine that were far more popular and relevant.
Thankfully, this is when I discovered Substack. I actually came across this space through it being casually mentioned by one of my favorite channels ‘Angel Souls’, which is run by Michelle Patterson, the author of
(a strange coincidence, but I rarely believe in coincidences).So, after a decade of meandering around the internet, I have found a cozy corner here, and this is why:
Community. We are here to read, to be enriched in some way, to have an experience that we can’t get elsewhere. This is my kind of person, no matter your demographic, your interests or your background. Although I was able to find incredible people on Youtube (I’m eternally grateful for you if you’re reading this right now, you know who you are) the majority of viewers on other platforms simply take what they want and leave. They do a search on Youtube, find my video on a topic of interest, get a piece of information they’re looking for, and leave. They don’t interact by commenting (if only to ask for a free reading) and when they do it’s often oddly written or nonsensical. I hate to say this, but people with reading comprehension, which is the vast majority of people who find themselves on Substack, tend to also be more intelligent than the average online consumer, and it shows. Which brings me to my next point.
Engagement. It has been my experience that the people here have things to say that make a solid contribution, whether it be on other publications, or their own. This is not a home for brain rot and typical marketing, even though it does happen. I’ll take the ‘How to Grow Your Audience on Substack’ posts over the hours of advertisements and pop up ads. I’ll take it over seven-second media and influencer culture. God help us if Substack ever makes that move.
Creative freedom. My favorite feature. You can make something that you genuinely want to make here, which many of us forget, is the whole point to all of this. You can be original and create something authentic that others will subscribe to and perhaps even be willing to invest in without adhering to mindless trends or rules of the algorithm just so that anyone will see it. When you have a publication platform like Substack, there’s almost no limit to what you can do. Your publication can be a podcast, or feature videos or your art. It can be about cooking, comedy, nature, current events, anything at all. You do not have to be an influencer here (nor should you be) to have a voice. This is why many people have found a home here on Substack, as the mindless influencer machine has created a lot of echo chambers and less freedom of expression.
Freedom of speech. As I already started to explain in my intro, there’s no guarantee that my content will reach the eyes of my subscribers on other social media platforms. I spoke about this at great length in a video I made on my channel called ‘Let’s Talk About Censorship’. For the time being, I do not have the fear of mentioning buzz words and current events in fear of my content being curtailed or my monetization jeopardized while I’m writing on Substack. Like it or not, big brother media does not want us organizing online, and they will and have been doing a lot of subtle things to prevent this. I recently posted a very controversial journal entry that was received much better than I expected. That was a small test, and I have settled in a little deeper here following that.
Getting paid as a creator. Within just a couple of months of my publication, I already had some paid subscribers, and I think that has a lot to do with the altruism of Substack users, not just that I was sitting on writing that had value this whole time and thinking otherwise. Substack’s model relies on subscription revenue commissions rather than ad-revenue, which prioritizes the creators making content for the platform rather than the companies that are fighting for our attention to buy their products. See how this makes more sense? So far, Substack has pioneered in investing in its writers, and I strive to become a better writer and content creator over time so that I can make a solid contribution to this effort.
Less empty-calorie media. The key word here is ‘less’. This is the internet after all, and it’s not perfect. I think all of us can agree that mainstream social media is making us stupid. I find the blaring environment of places like TikTok to be numbing and the short-form content to be fruitless. I will not be catering to the base desires of the amygdala here, or anywhere, and if that sounds like something you want to be apart of, welcome to Metanoia.
If you made it to the end of this post, you’ll be the first to know that starting in 2025, I will be leaving Youtube and keeping my content exclusively on Substack. I haven’t yet informed my audience over there but have an announcement scheduled for the 1st of January. Thank you so much for being here, whether you’re new or you followed me here from YouTube, or even Wordpress.
Happy Reading 📚
Happy Writing ✍️
Happy Creating 🎨
Well written, thank you for sharing your thoughts so eloquently. I hold the same sentiment.
I wasn't necessarily depressed, but social media had initiated a phase in which I literally began to give up on humanity. I began to feel the isolation, I suppose.
Civilisation relies on two pillars of virtue: 1) civility and 2) intelligence.
If our conduct cannot maintain these virtues, we descend back into the dark ages — morally and cognitively ("what is a woman").
Yet, residing on X, all you see is people committing drive-by vitriol. These are the articulations of primal emotions that desire to express disagreement, but remain utterly without substantiation. The same occurs on other platforms.
I sometimes look at the comments on Jordan Peterson's posts — all you see is hate, but no intelligent substantiation. Therefore no _conversation._ Just violent _accusation._
I sometimes tried to invite these individuals into dialogue, but it was to no avail.
I found the fact that these people —these millions of people— to actually represent the adult world to be genuinely alarming.
What prospects remain for a world ruled by empathy and reason?
My own reflective communications ever remained ignored among the amplified noise of polarisation. I began to accept I must not have anything to say, that could possibly be of interest to others. A similar silence awaited me on Medium.
A month ago I joined Substack.
My notes actually get a little engagement.
Some people read and appreciate my posts.
I nearly gave up as a writer, but have refound motivation.
I am grateful to the Substack community.
nice post and i agree! I’m still a newbie on the platform but so far it’s been much more nourishing when it comes to quality of content and interaction. keep writing!