For the last 7 months, I’ve felt quite uninspired to post on YouTube anymore, and for longer than that, I’ve toiled with what exactly is my “Why” for posting. I’ve felt like a failure on YouTube for a while, and it wasn’t until a conversation with my uncle that I considered that maybe I should change my idea of success in the first place. For as long as I could remember, “success” on YouTube (for me) was reaching 100,000 subscribers, and having at least 10% of my subscribers watching every video. But relying so heavily on analytics as a measure of my success quickly began to take a toll on me and strip away the joy of creating.
Yesterday, I took it upon myself to re-define what success is to me, but first, I needed to identify why I even wanted to make YouTube videos in the first place. So, like many of us do, I opened up the notes app on my phone and typed away. In this conversation with myself, I not only realized why I post on YouTube and re-defined success, but I came to the root of why I’ve been so uninspired, and why I haven’t been showing up for myself. I’m sharing that conversation with you in this post. I hope it helps guide you in your own self-reflections to get to the bottom of why it is you may not be showing up for yourself, either.
The Conversation.
Q: What is success?
–Success is contingent upon the goal or objective you’re trying to achieve.
Q: So what am I trying to achieve? What’s the point of this? Why am I making YouTube videos and how do I determine that I’ve reached this achievement?
Q: Am I trying to achieve something? Attain something?
Q: Why did I start YouTube?
–I started YouTube to document my journey through growing my hair and my flexibility journey. I wanted to show the progression of my growth in these areas. I wanted to document life. Share my life with the internet.
Q: What did I hope to achieve?
–I don’t remember.
Q: What do I want to achieve today?
–I want to capture the journey of becoming the woman I envision myself to be. Fulfilling my desired self image.
Q: How will I know that I’m successful? How do you “reach” success when the journey is ongoing?
Q: Is there a long term manifestation of success that I’m not anticipating?
Q: How will I know that what I’ve done has meaning? Is it an external indicator or an internal indicator? —meaning, do I only gauge my success by how it’s received or how it makes me feel?
Q: Why does it need to have meaning? Is that what I feel like indicates success? When something has meaning?
–I think success, for me, is a feeling of fulfillment. It was so easy to feel like I fulfilled something when I used numbers to measure my accomplishments.
Q: What gives me a sense of fulfillment?
–Right now it’s that outward reception. When people comment and say that it reached them. But on YouTube it feels like there’s so many eyes and not enough mouths. I can’t stand the feeling of people just watching and not saying anything. I think the root of that is wanting to feel connections. Being seen isn’t enough for me.
Q: Or is it? Would I be okay with 100,000 views and 0 comments? Do I just want the attention? What if I had 100,000 views and no likes?
–I think that at first I would be okay with 100,000 views and no likes or comments because I don’t currently receive that. But after that I would feel the sadness of not getting likes or comments. I would want those, too. It kind of feels like nothing will ever be enough.
Q: Once again: What do I want to achieve today?
–I want to capture the journey of becoming the woman I envision myself to be. Fulfilling my desired self image.
Q: But what’s the point? Document it for what? Do I truly care to look back? If I didn’t post it to YouTube would I still want to document it?
–Probably not. I want to share my talent to be seen and marveled by many.
Q: But why? What do I gain from them marveling at my work?
–I can gain financial freedom. Esteem.
–When I think about the videos I’ve been making, they don’t inspire me. I don’t feel inspired by my life right now. My inspiration comes from outward sources. From what I see around me. I think my lack of inspiration right now comes from my feelings of unfulfilled dreams and goals and desires for myself. It’s great to share my life when I’m on top of the world. But what happens when the world is on top of me?
“It’s great to share my life when I’m on top of the world. But what happens when the world is on top of me?”
Jazmine Harris
–I don’t feel inspired to share my journey right now because I’m too busy wishing I was at my destination. I don’t show up for myself so that I can get to my destination, so I’m too busy feeling discontent and discouraged and defeated. And angry. And envious.
Q: Why don’t you feel successful?
–I guess I don’t feel successful because I don’t like the way my life looks. When I imagine myself living the life I want, I feel inspired to film that. Going to the gym, growing my hair out, clearing my skin, getting a job, betting on myself, getting those partnerships, so why don’t I?
Q: Why don’t I show up for myself?
— Because I don’t feel like I’m good enough to fulfill the vision of myself in my mind.
Q: Is my vision realistic?
–I think so. It can be tweaked but I feel like it’s realistic based on who I’ve been before.
Q: Why don’t I feel good enough?
–I’ve never been the version of myself that I’m trying to be yet. And that’s why I feel so much envy seeing people who were originally in the same boat as me make moves to get on a yacht. Or a cruise ship. Or even a jet ski. Because deep down I want it, too.
Q: Is it realistic to expect yourself to be good at being someone you’re trying to grow into?
–No. I’m going to be bad at being the person I want to be until I get good at being the person I want to be.
“I’m going to be bad at being the person I want to be until I get good at being the person I want to be.”
Jazmine Harris
Q: What do you want to achieve?
–I want to feel good, look good, and film good.
Q: What is success for you?
–Success is showing up for myself the way I want to so I can be proud of myself.
Q: So once again, why do you want to make videos?
–I want to document my journey to becoming who I want to be—showing up for myself so I can live the life I want.
Q: How will you determine your success on YouTube?
–By making videos I enjoy watching. Creatively and aesthetically. I like to watch my own videos over and over. If I make a video that I’m obsessed with watching, or that I’m proud to look at, then I’ve succeeded.
Diane
Your information was very inspiring. A lot of times one may feel the same way but keep it to themselves. Thanks for your openness!