It's really hard in the beginning as you... don't have any voting power, you don't have any followers, you haven't gained community's trust yet, you don't really know how it all works,you can see others making ridiculous amounts of steem by posting few pics taken from the web or copying news from the big outlets while you're being torn between jumping on the bandwagon or contributing quality content... and last but not least 95% of trending articles are by whales or wealthy dolphins, who've been here for a while, and getting upvotes for them is as easy as brushing your teeth is for you.

But I have to say that I really love this platform! However, it's not that easy to work your way up from the bottom, is it? Still I believe that if you have something valuable to add, you're gonna come through sooner or later. You have to help yourself though, no doubt about it!