For almost as long as I can remember, I've wanted to be a YouTuber. More accurately, I wanted to entertain people. I wanted to make content that people watched and gained something from.
And I'll get into these phases where I'll make maybe a dozen videos and then give up. And then a few months later, that cycle just repeats. Why?
I want to be a YouTuber. And the main thing a YouTuber does is make YouTube videos. So why don't I do it?
It's not cuz I'm bored or dislike it. I think it's because I perceive a disconnect between my effort and my impact. I get stuck looking at a number.
I'll spend hours on a video only for it to get 10 views and three likes. And it just felt like, what's even the point? Why am I doing this just for it to go nowhere?
And then I'd tell myself, it's the journey that matters. You keep hustling, that number is going to go up. and you like making these videos, so don't let the numbers discourage you.
But those affirmations never work. Maybe if I really understood the words, they would have, but as it stood, I was trying to convince myself of them, not reminding myself of them. And so, I stop uploading for a few months until that voice in my head gets too loud.
I have some stupid little idea that I selfishly want to make and selfishly put out there to the world only for it to get 10 views and three likes. I call it selfish because who am I doing this for? It's only me.
No one is being impacted by my video. No one is going to take anything away from it. The only person that gains anything from my video is me.
That's what I used to think until I saw a video with nine views and two likes. One night, I was spiraling downwards. I was in one of those moods, I guess you could say.
It was just a terrible self-destructive headspace that felt super deep in the moment, like it was super serious and couldn't be patched up. But in reality, what we often think of as deep wounds in oursel are incredibly shallow. A quote unquote deep sadness can be fixed by a single text from the right person.
Or in my case, on that specific night, watching the right video with nine views and two likes. The video was raw. It had early 2000s niche vibes.
The camera had a lot of noise and it was a sketch with one guy playing two people just having a conversation. It was very specific, as if the video was made just for me. I watched it super late, like 3:00 a.
m. And for that night, it cured me. It impacted me.
It changed my entire mood. I really got something out of it. Something I did not think was possible.
And that video now had 10 views and three likes. One view is enough. One view is one person.
And impacting the life of one person will always be enough. This should not be a numbers game. We should not look at our analytics as the metric of success because it can't measure the impact your video had on someone's life.
What it can tell you is how many people that video reached. But it's not all about reaching someone. It's about what you say when you get their attention.
Saying hello to a million people is inconsequential compared to an actual conversation with one person. That's what I never got. If you can affect one person, then that is all that matters.
Impact cannot be defined by reach, only depth. And I was constantly conflating the two. Also, on a somewhat different note, it is okay to make videos for yourself.
It's probably what you should exclusively do. There is nothing selfish about putting yourself out there and making content that you want to make. And seeing 10 views and three likes after making a video you wanted to make shouldn't make you feel stupid for having made it or wanting to make another one.
We get so distracted with these analytics we forget why we are making content. It's because ultimately we want to. I got stuck with comparing my videos to vaguely similar ones by larger creators and it made me want to change my content, not improve it.
made me want to appeal to an audience that I for one did not want to appeal to and for another did not have. If you're not doing what you want to do on YouTube, it's going to be incredibly hard to stay motivated. Obviously, you need to grow and change.
Don't be stuck in your ways, but at the same time, don't sacrifice your voice. A tip that I've tried recently that has really been helping is to think about, well, if I did make it as a YouTuber and I had the community I wanted, what's the number one thing I would do? For me, it's make more YouTube videos, make the videos I want to make.
I would be religious at it because I don't want to blow it and lose it all. So, if you pretend like you are the YouTuber you want to be with the following that you want, that's how you get the following you want. This video will probably get 10 views and three likes.
But I'm going to treat it like 100,000 people will be watching because that is the only way 100,000 people will ever watch anything I ever do. But if it does get 10 views and three likes like my last video did, that's okay because I'll never know the impact this video might have on someone. We often forget just how much we affect.
One conversation can change someone's life. And what's beautiful is that YouTube and content creation allows you to have that conversation and that impact with a complete stranger around the world. And and to be clear, I'm not saying just make philosophical videos and that's the only way to impact someone deeply.
I believe that someone can be impacted by any kind of video. If someone is greatly entertained by your let's play series or laughs at your sketch, then you caused an impact that is meaningful and valuable. Even if it doesn't have a million views, you caused an impact.
Never underestimate that. Never underestimate the power of one view. Never underestimate the power of one person because one person is all it takes.
