- Yo.
So, I sat down and had a think.
And what I thunk was about all of the things
that have kept me inspired
over the past almost 15 years of making videos.
You'd think I'd be washed up and quit by now.
Some might argue that I already quit mentally,
and others might wish that I quit.
Thanks. You're nice.
But, no, unfortunately, I'm still here.
So, now I'm gonna tell you a bunch of the things
that I think have kept me inspired over these many years.
One, lower the bar.
Often we're not inspired because shirt is so hard
or we've built up things in our head
to be such a big obstacle that we don't try.
Just lower the bar.
You wanna start working out?
Do five pushups when you wake up in the morning.
Wanna build a house?
Build a house for birds.
Wanna make a movie?
Make a shot.
Wanna make a shot?
Make a TikTok.
Wanna make a TikTok?
What is that like stuttering Instagram thing called?
(keyboard typing)
I don't even know how to look this up.
China, - [China] Yeah.
- What do you call those Instagram stuttering effects?
- [China] Boomerangs. - Yeah, boomerangs.
Some of the most compelling films
I've ever seen are boomerangs.
Wanna write a novel?
Write a short story.
Wanna write a short story?
Write a poem.
Wanna write a poem?
Write a sentence.
Wanna write a sentence?
Write a gerund phrase.
Some of the most compelling narratives I've ever
read were gerund phrases.
"Fixing broken bicycles."
Oh, so true.
It hits you right here.
When I started this channel, I lowered the bar.
I said, "I'm gonna just give myself one day
and I'm gonna use the time I have,
I'm gonna use the equipment I have
and I'm just gonna make a thing.
I'm not gonna worry about making it look good."
- I took the day off of work today
so I could surround myself in this heavenly glow.
I'm feeling lazy.
- I'm not even gonna bathe before I do it.
- I didn't even wanna put on any pants today.
Lazy.
- I think a lot of inspiration comes
from having the time and space and energy to do it.
If you don't have time, you'll be like,
"I don't feel like it."
If it's seems too hard, you'll be like, (indistinct).
So adjust the goal post so it fits
in the time and space and energy,
and then when you do, you can do the 2nd thing on my list
of ways to find inspiration: complete a lot of things.
The act of finishing a thing is inspiring
for several reasons.
One, it just feels good and feeling good motivates you.
Two, if it turns out crappy, ugh,
you can easily forget about it
because you're already working on the next thing.
Three, it teaches you more about the entire process,
not just the beginning of the process
if you never finish it, but if you finish a novel
then you gotta go through the editing process
and the publishing process and then get to see
how an audience reacts to the thing you did.
So, if you do that a lot of times
all of it will get better and better.
And when you gain knowledge, you get excited
to want to use that knowledge.
For instance, I'm playing Elden Ring right now,
and sometimes I'll go to an article for looking
for tips or tricks and I'll learn something,
and then I get excited to go back to Elden Ring.
That's not the most productive thing to be doing, but...
There's a productivity law I came across,
it's not actually a law: Kinser's Law.
About the time you finish doing something,
you know enough to start.
And another one: Sturgeon's law.
90% of a everything sucks.
Make a lot of things, to learn how to get into that 10%.
3rd, develop an internal locus of control,
not locust of control that would require developing
a super advanced locust that you swallow
that then takes over your body and controls you.
I will never do that again.
Locus of control.
Locus just means like a fixed point.
Basically, if you're like, "Shirt happens,"
you have an external locus of control.
And if you're like, "Shirt might happen
but it'll be because I did a dookie,"
that's internal locus of control.
Basically focusing on what you can control
and trying not to the blame game all the time.
I made a video a long long time ago called,
"The Most Inspiring Video on YouTube" in which I claimed
that inspiration doesn't exist.
I don't really believe that inspiration doesn't exist.
I was just being a bit of a dookie,
but I was trying to combat the idea that it only happens
by waiting around and having just this inspirational wind
of excitement and magic slap you in the face, externally.
- Hey, beard lovers.
Hang on a second.
Waiting for inspiration.
(intro music) Nope, not ready for the intro yet.
(intro music) Not ready yet.
Bop, bop, bop.
- Bop, oh fine.
- The point is, if you're blaming external forces
for what's happening to you, it's very uninspiring
because you think you can't do anything about it.
I'm not saying those external forces don't exist
and should never be called out,
but I think it's good policy to try
to take ownership over your failures,
so that you can figure out how to solve the problem.
My attitude, most of my life has been
kinda just to assume failure.
I'm usually prepared for it emotionally,
so I don't fly off the handle when it happens.
I already know what to do in case of...
Failed that one.
In case of failure.
It's probably why I'm a video editor.
Next on the list: bust that cycle.
I got this phrase from Ze Frank.
Ze Frank was my biggest inspiration to
start doing this.
- "Busting your cycle" is where you take one aspect
of your life that's more or less constant
and you purposely bust it.
By temporarily breaking a routine,
you can often experience the world in a very different way.
This shift in perspective can often lead to elation
and a sense of possibility.
By going to the dentist, I was trying
to bust the cycle of not having people (beep) with my mouth.
- That's basically all I've been doing
on this YouTube channel for the past three years.
Get up super early, go to bed super early, quit alcohol
or coffee or the internet, or wearing a shirt or whatever.
Work upside down in your chair,
or even more ridiculous wear a button down and tie.
The point is to get out of a rut,
change it up, do something ridiculous.
Particularly if it seems really hard, like think
of something that is a line in the sand
like, "I would never do this",
I think it's an indication you should,
if it's legal.
I had a friend who hated seafood, never would eat seafood.
I'm never gonna eat seafood!
And he never did.
Well, I have another friend who did and now he loves it.
So, one example applies here.
This attitude obviously has transformed my life.
I was never someone who worked out on a regular basis.
Now I have an exercise room.
I ran a marathon.
You'd be surprised what you're capable of.
Five, think long term.
For me, minimizing the importance
of the things I'm doing helps.
Isn't this just a stupid video.
I hate it!
Not that far.
But I like to think of my projects
as just a tiny little blip in the entire universe.
Telling dumb jokes, giving you my dumb ideas.
I refer to these things as dumb
and stupid because then I'm not getting
up in my head about being important
and then that'll keep me from doing it.
The best way to minimize the importance
is to think of about it in the context of my entire life
and a way to do that.
I got from Austin Kleon's book, "Show Your Work".
In it, he talks about people inspired
by near death experiences, like Steve Jobs.
"Remembering that you're gonna die is the best way
to know to avoid the trap of thinking
you have something to lose.
You are already naked."
So, what I'm saying is picture Steve Jobs naked.
No, I mean maybe.
Whatever does it for you
but Austin suggests a good way to do that
without actually being near death is read obituaries.
Obituaries are like near death experiences for cowards.
Reading them is a way for me to think about death
while also keeping it at arm's length.
So, think about death.
Death!
Hey, this isn't inspiring to some people.
This is really inspiring to me.
Death!
It helps me accept or not care about failure at all
because, in the end, I will have a better sense
of what's really important: tacos.
Six, exercise your brain.
Play games, like Wordle.
Do puzzles, like Wordle.
Write.
If by write, you mean type, like Wordle.
Draw.
I can't connect that to Wordle.
Converse, especially with positive people.
(mumbles) (laughs)
Literal exercise.
There's studies that show
that physical exercise helps you mentally.
And if you can't believe studies, what can you?
Well, you probably shouldn't just take
all the studies at face value.
I mean, you do the research
Read.
Read widely, fiction and nonfiction.
I don't mean read widely, but you could.
Here's a bunch of books I was inspired by:
"Start With Why", "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a (beep)",
"Decisive", "Made to Stick", "Outliers",
"The Tipping Point", "Show Your Work"
and "How to Do Nothing".
Do nothing, inspiration.
Speaking of, take breaks.
Exercise, meditate, take walks, yoga, play video games.
One of my favorite ways to take breaks is to walk upstairs
and say dumb things to my wife.
Hey China.
- [China] Yeah.
- How are you?
- [China] Great. Why?
- I'm just asking
- [China] And then.
- Thank you, bye.
And of course, do nothing.
I think I'm gonna make a video where I do nothing
for an hour every day for a month.
Not meditate, not go for a walk.
Sit in nature and do nothing or sit inside and do nothing.
The point is, being tired, kills your inspiration
but it's only temporary.
You need to take breaks, get enough sleep, which I struggle
with sometimes, and be reasonable.
And finally, self-talk.
Do a gratitude journal or, just in your head,
think about the things you're thankful for.
That always helps me.
Affirmations.
I tried affirmations in the mirror for a video.
I don't, I don't know if it really helped much,
but I came across this TikTok
from motivational guru guy, Jim Kwik.
- Your brain is like a super computer
and your self-talk is a program that will run.
So, if you tell yourself you're not good
at remembering names, you will not remember the name
of the next person you meet
because you program your supercomputer not to.
- And I've been noticing at times being
kind of negative in my head.
Pessimistic about ideas that I have for videos
and just kind of changing my language in my head.
Go back to the other things I mentioned
like this is just a blip in the universe.
It's just a dumb video the next one will be better.
In fact, this one will be awesome.
You're so amazing!
And stupid stuff like that.
It's just so easy to make the default sort of cynical.
It's a way we protect ourselves,
but when you're trying to be creative, it's not useful.
I think we're also afraid of deluding ourselves
and getting egotistical and we see some
of that behavior in public figures that we don't like
and we just don't wanna be that.
But I often think I'm overcompensating
and I need to fight it,
and when I do it usually works.
I'm so awesome.
Ugh!
Awesome!
I know, being cynical is a lot cooler
and you're taking less risk doing that,
but it's so hard to be so cynical when I'm so awesome.
So that's it.
I hope this helps you find inspiration on a regular basis
but not too much take breaks and just do stuff or whatever.
And now that I've helped you get inspired,
I'd like to tell you about a VPN made
by Nord.
Thank you to NordVPN for sponsoring this video.
I had to change clothes because of the excitement
of such an exquisite VPN got me all sweaty.
A VPN is a virtual private network
which will help protect you from the FPM
which stands for (beep) Public Mine field
that is the actual internet.
Basically, what a VPN does is much like when my mom called
when I was out cow tipping with friends as a teenager
it tells the internet you're in a different place
than you actually are,
and that place is one of more than 5,400 different servers
in 60 countries.
It's like teleportation except way more boring,
but that's good.
Boring is good.
Boring is safe.
We want boring.
We even got double VPN,
V-V-P-P-N-N for extra protection routing
between two different VPN servers.
Double the encryption double the boredom.
Boredom because no one's stealing your identity.
I'm so bored because no one is stealing my identity.
But what's not boring is you still have access
to the awesome TV shows that you would normally
not have access to when you're traveling
because you have Nord.
You can just tell it that you're still at home
so you can keep watching your,
"Real Housewives of Toledo", or (indistinct).
Shirt!
And if you are worldly,
(sipping)
you can watch the shows you don't have access
to while you're at home.
Right, China?
Oh, that's not China.
That's my wine.
Non-alcoholic China and I are
in the middle of quitting alcohol for a year.
When I tell you that, with Nord,
you are protected from the baddies out there,
if that makes you feel annoyed
because then you don't get to steal people's identities,
maybe you should ask yourself, "Are we the baddies?"
That's a reference to a British show
that at the time of its release,
I did not have access to because Nord did not exist.
You do not know how good you have it.
So take advantage of this...
I almost said mo fo.
I was supposed to say moment.
So take advantage of this mo fo.
Seriously, it's good.
It's simple.
It's gimple.
It works.
Go to nordvpn.com/wheezy for an exclusive NordVPN deal.
Hell, but it's risky.
Nope, there's a 30 day money-back guarantee.
Give a try.
Now, I will metaphorically use Nord to make you think
that I'm dressed fancy again, even though I'm still
in these clothes much like how Nord...
You get it.
That's it.
Thank you for watching.
I've been doing live streams of me editing
these very videos over on Wheezy news.
I'll link down there.
Newsletter, that I've been doing every Tuesday,
Tuesbetter Newsletter.
Be a Tuesbetter Newsletter getter.
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Been making some short videos
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I'll link down there.
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Death!