Bye, Medium.

This is not a story to criticize the platform though I’ve become increasingly frustrated with how I’ve been treated in the last year. Like I mentioned before, it’s not the falling earnings that bother me but how Medium reduced my income, while virtue signaling and lying.

I want to repeat — LYING. Yes, I’m a bit bitter. I’ve not always been honest in my life, but for me, writing and running are all about integrity. Medium breached its integrity with its larger-than-life calls to fix the internet or improve the platform while reducing the reward to its main contributors (such has been my experience, anyway).

But the real problem is me, not Medium. Just as seasons change, I change too. The seasons in California, which I love so much, are less pronounced, but they still exist.

For the last 2.5 years, my Medium writing has been a hot mess, and I mean that in a good way. I wrote on a diverse range of topics. I had no niche. Whatever came to mind, I wrote about it: Russia, family, running, pop culture, current affairs, career. I wrote close to 900 stories. I was happy to see my audience grow.

But now, I want more simplicity and clarity in my life, and that means focusing on fewer things, in my writing too. I want to concentrate on my family, my work, and my passion for running, which I am expanding into youth coaching and other endeavors.

On the writing front, I have a major literary undertaking — a memoir in the works. While much of the manuscript is done, I’ve struggled to complete it…