This Decision Nearly Ruined My Entire Life

A story of deception.

No teenager deserves to face this. I narrowly escaped the prison I built for myself.

2018 was the raging era of vloggers. Peter Mckinnon and Casey Neistat were leading the charge, followed by millions of aspiring noobs like me. Who wouldn't? Make videos about your life and get money? Yes, please.

Only one problem.

It wasn't working.

I was convinced—delusional even—that I was about to get famous. That I just have to hold on a little longer before it’s all going to be worth it. Sound familiar? Welcome to hustle culture, where you bang your head against a wall trying to break through while simultaneously ignoring the jackhammer beside you. It looked like this:

I published a video every day and slept 5 hours a night. While working 10 hours a day. I was "obsessed." You can still see some of those videos on my channel. Please don't, lol.

I did that for over 100 days in a row before I completely fell apart.

Broke down.

Burnt out.

18 years old.

It was not a good situation.

I was confused, disappointed, and crushed. I had believed people who said it would work. That if you just keep pushing, you’ll have to break through at some point. No one tells you that the ones who don’t “break through” don’t have an audience. No one hears their side of the story. I certainly didn’t. I listened to the 0.1% who had “made it” and who thought they had the answer as to why.

That’s when I realized this truth.

No matter how hard you believe, if you're doing the wrong thing it won't work.

Someone else in your life needs to read that. 👆

Also, illustrated like this. 👇

(More posts like that on my Instagram by the way)

The other unsung reality is by the time you learn this on your own, it has likely already broken you.

Thanks for the moral boost Austin.

Right, about that. You see, there are two things you, the reader, can do with this information.

1. Ignore it. Austin just doesn’t believe enough and knows nothing about my situation.

2. Evaluate and see where you’re at. Numbers don’t lie.

You’re smart, so I’m assuming we are going with the second one. In 2018 I also was smart, but had no one to guide me through this process. Now it’s my turn to pay it forward. Let’s step in it and see what it smells like.

First stop. Truth bomb.

Ok, you’re not going to like this, trust me. But you absolutely must get this truth if you want to be successful. I’ll give you 3 quotes just in case the first one doesn’t land.

“Self-deception can be more comforting than self-knowledge.” - Russ Roberts

“The human mind has an infinite capacity for self-deception.” - Gertrude Atherton

“The first principle is that you must not deceive yourself. And you are the easiest to deceive.” - Richard Feynman

I’m not saying you are disillusioned, I’m simply asking you to acknowledge that it’s possible to deceive yourself. If you can’t acknowledge that, experience will be the only teacher that will get through. It’s ok to loosen the grip on your dream and ask, “Does all this line up?” It’s terrifying to acknowledge this. But that’s where it has to start. And trust me, you’d rather catch it now than later.

How do I know if I’m deceiving myself?

Let’s look at a few ways to do this. Ways I wish I had in 2018.

First, you’re probably not the next Elon Musk. If you think you’re right, and everyone else is wrong, you’re probably wrong. Obviously, you can’t listen to haters, but if the input is coming from people who aren’t stupid, who have your best interest in mind, and who know you well, pay attention.

The easiest way to get ahead on social media is by telling people what they want to hear. And we love to hear “You’re a natural genius with the revolutionary ideas and you should believe in yourself even though literally no one else in the entire universe can see them.”

If you’re too afraid to evaluate whether or not you’re an idiot, you’re probably an idiot.

Send that to someone, I dare you 👆

The second thing we must do is evaluate our position. I wish so much I had someone to do this with me. I had lots of well-meaning people, but YouTube was new and no one I trusted could help. We need to have people in our lives that we trust enough to help us evaluate where we are.

To evaluate our position, we have to first identify the desired outcome. Then we have to figure out where we are in relation to the end goal and how fast we are growing. Let’s teleport back to 2018 and do this with the 18-year-old version of myself.

What’s the desired outcome? To make videos about whatever I want and make money with it.

How much money do you need? $4,000 a month.

How many views do you need to be getting monthly to make that? Around 400,000-600,000 consistent views per month (plus figuring out how to do sponsorships).

How many are you getting per month right now? About 500.

How many views were you getting last month? About 400.

Last year? About 300 per month.

So you grew 25% last month and you haven’t made a cent off YouTube yet. If you stay at that rate it will take a few thousand months to reach your goal. What’s your strategy for growing 100,000%? Uhhhhh. No idea.

So you have no strategy, no mentor, no experience, and you plan on growing your channel 100,000% in 3-6 months. Do you see lots of other people in your situation doing this?? Ok, you made your point.

When you stop and evaluate, it becomes infinitely more clear. That’s why the most important step is the first one, stopping and acknowledging that this could be happening. If you never stop, you’ll never see it. By identifying what you need to achieve your goal, where you started, and where you are in that process it’s really hard to deceive yourself. But you have to find a metric to measure and track your progress.

I do this on a regular basis with my channel now. I know exactly how much money I need to make, what I need to get there, and where I'm at in that process.

Wait, are you telling me to give up on my dream?

Never! But you had better be realistic with your timelines and abilities. If evaluating where you’re at shows you that it’ll take you 10 years and you planned on it taking 18 months, that’s a big difference. It’s dangerous to gamble with your time. You have to get incredibly clear on your timelines. Pace yourself if needed. Most of all, figure out what you need to accelerate the process.

If you never look at what’s not working, you’ll never find a solution.

Here’s the key. When I finally realized I was way off track and quite delusional, I didn’t give up. I didn’t say “Well I messed that up, I guess it’s not for me.” I did the work to get clear on the goal, researched and studied to see what worked, and started again. I rebranded in 2020, and within 2 years I’d made significant progress.

If someone less intelligent and less experienced than you is doing it, that means there’s a strategy. Find it. Success leaves clues.

Now, go evaluate where you are. Do the work. You’ll thank me later.

P.S. Send this post to someone you think is delusional. Someone who’s me in 2018.