The Burnout is Real for Creatives
Burnout is real, even your passions. I've experienced it in church ministry, in my professional career, and now even in my creative endeavor of being a youtuber. I was under the impression that as long as it was my hobby, as long as it was something that I enjoyed that I could NEVER burn out. Couldn't be farther from the truth.
Despite the pandemic, things started out pretty good in the beginning this year committing to publishing videos on my Youtube channel. I was able to do the one video a week without any problems or high hurdles, or so I thought. I bit off more than I could chew and sprinkled vertical videos here, more scripts here and more branding related tasks over there. Yes, it got overwhelming real fast.
Eventually the signs of my burn out was emerging from my fatigue.
I felt disassociated with my progress in anything
On top of the physical friction to produce anything creative, I was also mentally absent
After much consuming of media and other online content I found myself more disconnected with the purpose of wat I was doing.
I could stop and take a break on things whether a week or a month. Although I admire those who hustle, I continued to push through to publishing a video every week just because I believed this was the "lowest barrier to entry", or the least amount of contribution that I could make without going too crazy. It wasn't like I was doing a Gary Vaynerchuk with like 5-10 things of content a day. I tried to do like 3-4 more things to prepare and post throughout the week. I only missed one week thus far, I forget the reason why but, I've got nearly over 50 published videos to show for it.
The least that I could put out was more than good enough. The worst thing that I could do was live in regret that I couldn't at least post one thing, in my case a video, a week. I stopped and started Youtube around 3 times already, and I knew that I could AT LEAST and AT THE MINIMUM do one video a week.
Besides the fact that I was riding the mindset of, "Done is better than perfect," I was also reflecting and riding on my value of creating out of passion and impact. Yes, I believe that as a creative, you could work and develop an entrepreneurial mindset and lifestyle to get paid to produce work, especially at a larger scaled business, but I wanted really take the risk but also commit a lifestyle to creating and sharing something meaningful to the world.
Burnout caused by overworking is a reminder to myself to slow down, refocus on my priorities and my lifestyle. Sustainability is a big word that comes across my mind. Is it practical for my to produce content like this every week? Is it wise that I try to focus all my powers and resources into one social media platform or should I also split some time to work on my personal website?
Be a good boss to yourself, be a kinder person to yourself. I know I could do more, but I also have to remember that it's the long game, a long journey and that I should stop to enjoy the process on top of the regular routines and workflows of a creative. I accomplished the one video a week, but now it's time to be ahead of the game and produce at least two videos a week while posting once a week.
The worst thing I could do right now is NOT show up to the work that I like to do. So here I am, PRESENT!
"If we aim at the moon—we may hit a star! Shoot for the moon. If you miss it, you will still land among the stars." - Norman Vincent Peale
