Great post, but also a challenging overall package: perseverance, patience, interaction, strategy, motivation...

For me (as for many people here, I think), motivation is a bit of a rollercoaster ride, sometimes it goes up and sometimes down. Without patience it becomes difficult, but especially without friends, which is why I find comments so important, not just to get upvotes. And of course upvotes are also important, they have an effect on motivation, more motivation leads to more interaction and this in turn leads to more upvotes. It's actually quite simple :-)