I thought my earlier post was successfully published because it was visible on my own profile. I even boosted it twice—first for$ 0.35 , then again for $0.52 —expecting it to appear in the promoted feed. But there were no reactions or comments, which made me wonder if it had been hidden.
Then #Chucha told me she couldn't see the post at all. That's when I continued digging into the issue. After doing more research, I finally found the answer.
The easiest way to understand it is to think of a relay as a post office.
When you publish a post on Nostr, your app doesn't send it directly to everyone. Instead, it sends your post to one or more relays, just like dropping a letter at a post office. The relay's job is to store your post and deliver it to anyone who visits that relay.
In my case, it seems my post was delivered to a relay that wasn't very active or wasn't well connected. Imagine dropping a letter at a small post office that rarely sends mail to other branches. Your letter is safely there, so you can still see it, but people checking other post offices may never receive it.
That's why the post appeared on my profile but wasn't visible to many other users. It wasn't hidden—it just didn't propagate through the network.
What I did was delete the original post and publish the same one again. This time it reached active relays, and the post immediately became visible to others.
Lesson learned: If your post is visible only to you but not to everyone else, don't panic. It doesn't always mean it's hidden. Sometimes it's simply a relay propagation issue. Choosing active relays is like mailing your letter through a busy, reliable post office—it has a much better chance of reaching everyone.