Very interesting, Allison. I am in the stage of getting my own website now more seriously too. As with you, it took me a while to be ready for professionalization.

Would you advise me to publish my important articles on my own website first? And then republish on Medium? And yes, my next step also will be to find outlets for my work that pay me as an independent writer (more like a freelance journalist/indie blogger).

As I'm not a native writer to England or USA, I have to do some research still to find the right ones for my kind of work. But I'll get there. Thanks for telling me about these issues. It helps!