I said it before, you need to build a repatriation, then the merit does not matter anymore..
I hate when I have to quote myself but here it is..
Congrats!
Everyone can rank up, but if you wrongly prioritize your goals, it may never happen.
People putting their priorities in the following order fail.
1. Get Merit
2. Rank up
3. Get more money.
4. Go to 1.
The right priorities are :
1. Be curious
2. Start reading
3. Learn
4. Be part of the community
5. Do something to help the others
The result will be exactly what the the guys from the first list are aiming for.
Sadly, worked other way around for me...I was curious about mining, started reading about it, learned about modding bioses,
became part of altcoin mining community (dare to say, recognized one), made bioses that were downloaded thousands times, got 0 merit
then switched to your supposedly fail order of things, and got some