I have been writing for the odyssey for a few months now, and I always got discouraged because I had a low view count. I always wanted to be that writer whose article went viral, or that writer who wrote the article that everybody can relate to. The thing is, I have been writing for as long as I can remember.

When I was little, I wrote in a diary. I dabbled with songwriting and writing lyrics for a bit. I put my all into my research papers and short stories I had to write for school. When I found out I could write for the odyssey, I jumped to that opportunity.

The more I thought about my past experiences with writing, the more I thought about the type of audience I had. When I wrote in my journal, there was no audience, it was just me. When I wrote songs, there would be the 40 viewers or less on my youtube channel. When I wrote my research papers, the audience would be a peer and/or my teacher who went over the paper.

I wrote in my journal because I felt better. I wrote songs because it was what I enjoyed at the time. I wrote papers because well, I had to. However, we could sometimes choose what we wanted to write about which is part of why I enjoyed writing. So why should the Odyssey be any different?

I enjoy writing for the Odyssey. It takes my mind of some stressful things, it gives me something to do, and it gets my brain thinking about what to write about next. I realized that I'm doing what I love and it shouldn't matter if my article goes viral or not because I'm not writing to become viral. I'm not writing to become famous. I'm writing for me and only me.

If you're in the same boat I was in, take my word for it. If you enjoy writing, then write! Don't let the amount of views stop you. It may happen one day, but if you stop writing, then you'll never know.