Why do we participate on Hive? Why do we crate elaborate (or not so elaborate) posts? Why do we do anything, at all?

Motivation is a fascinating topic, and a far bigger one to deep dive than a simple post on Hive can cover.

The thing I do find interesting, though, is that we all have our own interpretations of what constitutes a "worthwhile" endeavor.

And — in the simplest of terms — the relationship between "effort" and "reward" has to stay pretty much in balance or we stop being happy campers and will likely just quit or look for something else to occupy our time.

Although this is an overall human situation, Hive is actually a good example to illustrate this: Consider how the level of activity in our community tends to fluctuate substantially, according to what the price of our Hive token — and consequently people's rewards — is doing.

A lot of folks give lip service to the idea that they are "not in it for the money," yet we would see quite clearly that if the price of Hive is $1.60 rather than the current $0.16, the activity level here would rise substantially.

It would be easy to point the dirty finger at greed, but that's a pretty superficial scapegoat.

I believe it all comes back to this idea of something fitting on people's scale of "is this worthwhile?" In other words, is the time and effort I'm going to give going to be a balance/match for what I get back?

Certainly, rewards are often intangible. Why will we sometimes spend a couple of hours preparing a very complex and specific meal when we could just as easily "fill our stomachs" by eating a banana in less than 60 seconds?

Regardless, we experience a sense of balance in the effort/reward relationship... or we wouldn't bother with that two-hour prep time.

And even that can become somewhat convoluted, particularly if we hand off responsibility for the reward part of the equation to something external to ourselves... which, in most cases, is what we end up doing.

Consider the scenario in which we "give" about $6.00 for a Big Mac, and the reward is that it's kind of crappy. Chances are we'll still go back to McDonald's in the future. Conversely, consider the scenario in which we "give" $100.00 or more for a dinner at a 4-star restaurant and the reward is that it's kind of crappy. Chances are we'll never go back to that place.

A version of that exists right here in our community when people start complaining about putting a lot of effort into creating some piece of content and then ending up with a 5-cent reward, at the end of it.

It is also complicated further by the reality that there is a difference between individual cases, and the broad average of experience.

Personally, I am someone who has always "played the averages" because I have had singularly little success with so-called "moonshots."

For example, as an online seller for many years, I learned to become quite detached from the result generated by one specific item, and instead focused on the fact that some products will turn out to be complete losers who were dead in the water from the start, while others turn out to be unexpected massive upside surprises. And when you average it all out, you end up with something you either find to be good enough, or possible not good enough.

That's generally how investment portfolios work, as well. The one or two stocks you own that go 10x in a could of years make up for the 15 stocks you own that either went sideways or lost ground. Your average looks good.

I try to approach Hive — and crypto in general — from pretty much the same perspective. In the long run, the $10 posts make up for the 15-cent posts, and I wind up with an average that works well for the "Efforts vs. Rewards" balance... EVEN IF it feels a bit salty when "that one post" I put so much work into ended up earning just 20 cents.

And with that, I'm going to take the rest of the day off, ahead of the inevitable election circus and fireworks we're in for, this coming week!

Till the next one... Feel free to leave a comment — this IS "social" media, after all!

=^..^=

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