Hello, and welcome to this episode. The last 2 years have been harder than any of us could have anticipated. And I can see how easy it would be to throw in the towel and give it – being YouTube, entrepreneurship, content creation…give it all up. So let’s talk about that in today’s episode.
Episode 19: If you feel like giving up or you just can’t get motivated…listen to this – Podcast Transcript
The last two years have been harder than any of us could have ever anticipated, and I can see how easy it is to want to throw in the towel and give it being YouTube entrepreneurship, content creation to give it all up. But let’s talk about that in today’s episode.
If you feel like giving up, if you feel like you just can’t get motivated to keep going with your business, keep listening. Hey, Thrivers. I’m Sara Nguyen, creator of the Thriving Creator Academy, and I’m here to help you go from stuck and overwhelmed to becoming a confident, profitable, and thriving YouTube creator.
Join me here each week for honest conversations about what it really to be a successful YouTube creator without compromising your creativity, sacrificing cheeky drinks with the people you love or downtime for yourself. You’ll hear about the hard lessons I’ve gone through so you can avoid making the same slow and constantly mistakes on your journey.
As well as my secret weapons to help you dig deep and do the work it takes. I’m honoured and grateful to have this opportunity to share this together with you right here on the Thriving Creator Podcast. I’m glad you’re here. Let’s get started.
In my world view, there are a couple of things that are essential for becoming a successful YouTube creator and entrepreneur. Number one is persistence. Number two is scrappiness. Scrappy as being being able to make it work with the resources that you’ve got. And number three is good Internet.
Now we could very easily argue that wine or coffee or any other beverage choice should be on that list. But the one that I really want to talk about today is persistence. At the time of this podcast recording Sydney, Australia my hometown has been in the current lockdown for 85 days straight.
And this is not to say I’m in lockdown and you’re not. My point is that I understand what it’s like to have things happen out of your control. They simply make it really hard to get motivated or even to keep going with your YouTube and business journey.
For me personally, this year, this lockdown has been incredibly challenging and this year it’s been a lot. My younger brother passed away and I’ve been grieving. We’ve been in lock down and I haven’t been able to see the people I love and feel supported by in person with all of the restrictions.
And like most people in lock down, I feel the anxiety and I feel the unending feeling of doom, like it’s just not ever going to stop. And I’ve struggled with consistency and showing up on my YouTube channel as I try to cope with everything that’s going on right now. And it’s hard.
And I’m going to be very honest to say that there have been days recently when I thought about just giving up on the channel and throwing in the towel, particularly days when I get these abusive comments on my YouTube channel or in my DMs that are just absolutely uncalled for and appalling.
And even though everything feels like a dumpster fire right now, I mustered up a tiny bit of grit that I can to do a little bit each week for my YouTube channel for my business so that I can keep going. And even if my progress is really small and incredibly sloth slow, I know that this work as well is also not really largely visible by my subscribers, by my listeners, by my audience.
But I’m still working on creating behind the scenes, and I’m still doing things so that the wheels don’t completely fall off and it doesn’t completely stop spinning and that the engine is still running, even if it is at this glacial sloth slow speed, even if it is really slow, I’m still moving.
Last week I had a student who enrolled in my course, The Thriving Creator Academy, which is my signature YouTube course. She contacted me and told me that she was able to finally figure out how she would monetise her channel, which she had been struggling with forever because she had spent so much money purchasing the equipment, so much time learning how to do YouTube.
She hadn’t figured out after you upload your videos, after you launch the channel, what happens then? How do you make your money back? How do you make money on an ongoing basis? But through the course content, she was able to finally make a click.
And in addition to this, she felt incredibly excited and hopeful and had a vision for her channel and her business for the first time in years, and she had dreamed of starting a business with YouTube, and now she’s looking forward to creating content and developing her business and making sales.
And I could not be more ecstatic for her. And of course, this is just the beginning. She’ll begin to see momentum from her new direction. She’ll gain more confidence, and she’ll continue to grow as she shows up and she’ll create more. And the path that she will go on is just incredibly exciting.
And then I think about if I had given up on my business, and I think about if I had given up on my business and on my YouTube journey multiple times this year when I felt that everything was too much, then my student would never have gotten this breakthrough.
And I’ve always believed in the beauty and serendipity of life. And I really want you to let this sink in. If you have something of value to give, and most of you do, there’s someone out there who desperately need to hear it. So persistence, no matter how small, the progress that you’re making is, is incredibly important for you to keep going, keep showing up teeny tiny steps no matter how small they are, especially when you feel like you can’t get motivated.
It’s important for you to be patient with yourself and be okay with making smaller progress because there’s someone out there who needs you to stay connected and who needs your genius. So how do you do this in light of the tough things that are going on?
Here are my five steps to find peace among the chaos and to keep going. Firstly, instead of throwing in the towel, and as I said, I know what it’s like to feel so overwhelmed by everything happening that you just don’t want to do it anymore.
I just don’t want to keep going with the channel. Just don’t want to pursue the business anymore. When you have those feelings, start by taking a breath, step back. Even if it’s a four minute to give yourself some space to regain the clarity that you need to continue.
Secondly, prioritise your task and let things go. If you’re feeling overwhelmed like everything is in disarray, it’s likely you’re trying to do too much and you’ve got too many things going on at once. So this is the take tiny steps advice I was mentioning earlier.
More is not necessarily better. Allow yourself to focus on one thing at a time. Take things off the list. How one thing on the list that you do at a time. Thirdly, create a calm space for you to create. Now, this could be a nook or a spot in the house where you can work in peace for 30 minutes that no one can disturb you and you can’t get distracted.
Whether that’s hiding in the closet or in a corner of the house. Find a space for you and you only or it could be going out to a cafe or a park that you can actually access. But find that space where you can do the deep work uninterrupted.
Fourthly, turn some music on before you start. Take a moment to allow yourself to play your favourite song or peaceful music or whatever tune or style of music floats your boat so that it can transport you to a happy place and really just shift that energy and boost your energy.
And lastly, have one thing that is your target. Just one thing that’s it. Don’t write a list with the 25 things that you know you have to do. Start with just the one, right? That’s what you’re focusing on.
If it’s more than one, then you’ve got too much for that first block of work that you want to do. No matter how small the task is, it could be creating a graphic for social media. It could be writing a caption for social media. It could be writing the outline for your next video.
One task that you work on. Work on that until it’s done, then cross it off your list, pat yourself on the back. This is what I do and this is how I work and how I’ve been trying to work in this period of time where there’s just this overwhelming chaos and I don’t feel motivated, but I want to keep going.
I take one tiny bite at a time, and I remind myself, and I want to remind you that the work that we do, it really, really matters. And as I and as you take these tiny steps, we’ll continue to feel the desire later to take a larger step as we make this little incremental pieces of progress until we’re up and running again.
And it’s one step at a time and you’ve got this. The episode is over, but it doesn’t have to end. Head on over to thrivingcreatormasterclass.com the link is also in the show notes. If you’re ready to go from confusion to clarity and to finally ditch that self-doubt so you can build the profitable YouTube channel, you know, deep down you were always meant to create, then join me inside my signature programme, Thriving Creator Academy.
So you get the content, coaching and community you need to successfully implement my proprietary system so you can start reaping rewards of running a thriving YouTube channel. Thriving Creator Academy is a coaching programme for creators who are ready to transform their creative ideas into thriving YouTube channels.
Sign up to the Master class now to learn more at thrivingcreatormasterclass.com
