- Guys, welcome to this channel update
where we are going to be discussing the future.
The future of what?
Well, the future of this channel.
We are going to be discussing
some major new and exciting things
that are coming to this channel and this community.
What are these things, you might be asking?
Well, I have a merch line.
So I'm gonna be talking all about that,
where you can get this shirt today.
It is the Elizabeth shirt time wearing right now.
I'm very excited.
Anyway, we have that.
I have an email list that you can sign up for now
because I also redid my website,
and I have a P.O. box.
But also, I feel like one of the biggest factors
I wanna talk about in this video
is that I'm going to be making some changes
to the content on this channel.
So if you would like to learn about all of these things,
then please stay tuned for today's video.
So first up, the March line.
So a lot of you guys may know
that I had an Etsy store for a long time.
And honestly, it was a lot of stuff I had designed years ago
and it was just sort of running on autopilot.
But I was like, you know what?
I wanna create some new designs
that really tie in with my channel
and I wanna have it not on Etsy.
And so all of these factors combined to
the merch.
So I did move over some of the best selling stuff from Etsy
to my website
where you can find my merch at elliedashwood.com
But I also did design some new pieces.
I currently have the Elizabeth, the Darcy,
and the Catherine Morland from Northanger Abbey designs
up on my shop.
And I have a hoodie that's new that I'm super excited about.
It's embroidered.
It says born to be an heroine.
Yes, it's A-N.
An heroine.
Now, I had this big, huge mental debate on this
of whether to keep an before heroine
because I knew people were gonna be like,
"Why is there an N there, Ellie?
And the answer is because Jane Austin put an an there.
It's a direct quote
from the first chapter of Northanger Abbey.
Thereby, I was like,
we are sticking with the original text there.
So if anybody, after you get the hoodie,
is like, "What's with the N?"
You can be like,
"Take it up with Jane Austen, people."
Hmm-mm.
You can find all of elliedashwood.com.
And also my website is completely redesigned.
On my website, you can also sign up for my email list.
Do I have any clue what I am sending to people
on my email list?
No, because I've never had one before,
but I do think I'm gonna send you guys updates
on when new designs come out on my shop.
And so he can get updates on that.
And also just enjoy my probably awful emails
I will be attempting to send out
because I don't know what to send and or what to write,
but you can read them and laugh.
And isn't that what we live for?
To make sport for our neighbor
and laugh at Ellie Dashwood in our turn?
Yeah.
Also in other news,
I have a P.O. box
for this channel that you guys can send me stuff to.
I have to say this is something
some of you have been requesting.
I am definitely not saying you guys need to send me stuff.
No, that is not what I'm saying here.
But if you have been wanting to send me something
or you're just like Ellie needs this, I must send it.
I do have a P.O. box.
I'll list it down in the description below.
And I'll try to put it in the descriptions
of new videos coming out in the future.
Anyway, those have been some of the top highlights here.
The merch,
the website slash email list,
the P.O. box.
And now we've come to
probably one of the biggest announcements
I've ever made on my channel,
which is a change to my content.
Why did I save this for last?
Is it because it's the announcement
that's stressing me out the most?
Yes.
Yes, it is.
Let's talk about this.
Okay. First of all,
I have to say that you guys are amazing.
You're the best community on the internet.
I didn't think I was gonna like randomly cry
on this part of the video.
That was not foreseen.
Okay.
I am a person that does tend to cry, semi easily.
So it's just I really do appreciate you guys.
Like I would not be here with this channel or this community
without all of you
which is just like in my past videos,
I'm like, I don't know how I got this many subscribers.
I don't.
I kind of don't know how it happened.
Like I'm genuinely shocked
that this many people showed up.
And just the amount of love and support
you guys have given me
is far beyond anything I ever imagined would happen.
Right? Like I didn't imagine this happening.
And you guys are better than people's dreams.
Thank you guys so much.
And yeah, I really do appreciate it.
Should I tell you guys the story of my channel?
Maybe we need to understand the history of my channel
before we get to the future, right?
Like you have to understand the past
to really grasp the future.
In 2017, there were two main reasons I started this channel.
One is that I had an Etsy shop
and I just opened it
because my health problems were just bad.
And I was like,
I need to figure out a way to make money from home
and be my own boss.
So I was like, I'm gonna open an Etsy shop and sell art.
Did I have any clue on how to make art at the time? No.
But did that stop me? No.
I was really loving Jane Austen
and classic literature and history.
I was actually writing a novel set in the late Victorian era
that I was doing a lot of research for too.
So that was the theme of my Etsy shop.
I'm like, I'm gonna make art
about classic literature and history.
I start this Etsy shop,
and I also have no clue how to run a business.
I'm reading all these online articles
about how to have a successful Etsy shop.
Anyway, I came across this thing that was like
you need to start a blog to promote your shop.
So I started a blog.
I was reviewing all of these books
that I didn't even really initially wanna read.
They were not my type of books
but I felt like I had to read them
so then I could review them for this blog that I started
so that people would go to my Etsy shop.
It was very convoluted here.
Then I come across this other article that's like,
you need to start a YouTube channel
to promote your Etsy shop.
And I was like,
I don't even know what I'm putting on this blog.
How am I gonna start a YouTube channel?
That idea though, stayed in the back of my mind for a while.
I need to figure out how to start a YouTube channel.
What would I post?
And the thing is I kept watching period dramas
with my friends and family.
While watching these movies with them,
they kept asking me questions.
What's happening?
Or why can't the character do this?
Why is the character saying that?
What?
Why?
And so I'd pause it
and I would explain the time period to them
or the book to them.
And then we'd move on.
But finally, one day, those two things clicked.
I was like, okay.
My friends and family can't be the only ones
who have these questions
when they're watching the movies or reading the books.
And I need to start a YouTube channel apparently,
that's what I can talk about.
I can answer people's modern day questions
about classic literature.
And this is where we answer your modern day questions
about classic literature.
So I did make probably like fifteenish videos
over the course of the summer of 2017.
And then I stopped,
because honestly, I didn't know how YouTube worked.
The only people watching my videos
were my family and friends,
and nobody was buying stuff from my Etsy shop
because of these videos.
So I'm like, this is failing my goals here.
I kind of forgot I had a YouTube channel
for the next few years.
During this time period,
my friends would sometimes be like,
"Oh yeah, I came across one of your old YouTube videos
the other day."
And I was like, "Oh yeah, I have a YouTube channel.
I forgot."
I eventually gave up on my Etsy store.
It was still running.
It's been running till last month when I killed it
by turning it off.
It's so dramatic.
It's like I killed the Etsy store.
But everyone gave up on that and was doing other things
because I still don't know how to make Etsy work.
Anyway, fast forward to 2020 when,
you know, 2020 was crazy.
But it was another time period where I had this job
and it was just too much for me.
And it was like,
okay, again I need to find something I can do from home
and be my own boss.
And at that time,
I also came across information on how YouTube works,
how to make YouTube successful.
And so 2020 me was like, "I can do this."
I understand now how to do it.
I'm gonna do YouTube.
This is gonna be my new thing.
I know how it works.
Then I have this moment of like,
okay, but what content am I gonna put out on my channel?
It was at this point where I knew,
kind of like on this deep level,
that what I needed to put out was lifestyle content,
because it was something I felt like I could do
while also taking care of my health
and being reasonable and balanced.
My other option was obviously just to come back
with the type of content I had made in the past
about history and literature.
And the problem with that idea
was that I will not be able to physically sustain
that level of research required for those videos.
It's gonna burn me out.
Okay. So I'm faced with this decision in 2020,
which path do I go down?
Well, if you have guys been watching my channel,
clearly I went down the history and literature path.
My name is Ellie Dashwood and this is my channel.
Where I talk about classic literature and history.
If you like either of those things, please subscribe.
So you might be looking at that and ask,
well, why Ellie did you make that decision?
And why did you go with the thing
that you knew you could not sustain long term?
And the answer is because I was scared and it was safe.
It was the comfortable route.
I feel like there's things in our lives
that become part of our identity,
things that we're like, okay, we're good at,
we can do this and it'll be safe.
It'll be comfortable.
It's like our comfort zone.
And I, in school, was the kid that was good at school.
Like I was good at writing research papers.
I even liked writing research papers in school.
Honestly, after I graduated from college,
I remember this night laying in bed
and I had this realization that I would hypothetically
never have to write a research paper again.
And it made me sad
cause I have genuinely liked writing research papers.
Did I know any other kid in school
that liked writing research papers?
No.
And this is also why I'm weird.
But it was definitely a place of comfort for me
versus trying new things, branching out,
doing the things I really wanted to do
and that I thought would be good for myself
and my life and my health,
I did what I was comfortable with,
what I was familiar with,
what I felt like, okay, I'm semi competent at this.
So when I did come back in 2020 and I started posting again,
I just started posting more classic literature
and history stuff.
And over the past year and a half,
there has been major times
where I've just completely burnt myself out.
I felt like I've aged a lot.
I got old.
Have you ever seen those memes of presidents?
Like when they first become president,
and then four eight years later,
they aged dramatically
just from the stress of the job of being the US president?
Well, I aged just from the stress
of being this YouTube channel person.
I was laying in bed one night and I felt like,
you know that classic character in movies
who's older, overworked, middle aged guy maybe
who's just about to have a heart attack
because he was just so stressed out about his job, right?
That's what I felt like.
I felt like a middle aged man about to have a heart attack
cause I was stressed out about my job.
So after my old man heart attack movie moment,
I was like, okay, you know what?
I'm really gonna stick
to this every other week upload thing.
At least for me,
the YouTube algorithm really dislikes
the fact that I did that.
It has dropped my channel overall views ridiculously.
I didn't even know my channel could drop this low again
with as many subscribers as I have.
I was like, wow, you guys.
It's been very eye opening
just to how quickly YouTube can drop you.
And I am no way trying to say this to criticize YouTube
but they have very valid business reasons
for why they do what they do.
And it is definitely a business partnership
when you become a YouTuber.
I am not trying to criticize them at all
or be mad at them.
When my channel just crashed like this,
I just had this realization.
It's like I've been letting the fear
of the YouTube algorithm getting mad at me
hold me back from doing what I really wanna do.
I always still had that dream of like,
I wanna make lifestyle content.
I have this vision for it.
This was something I really wanted to do but I wouldn't do
because I was scared of angering the YouTube algorithm.
I was like,
"It's gonna get mad at me if I change my content."
And yet look, I did my best and it still got mad at me.
So I may as well just do whatever I wanna do.
And I was also just worried about letting you guys down.
I really realized that so many of you have encouraged me
to take care of my health.
Also you have told me you watch my videos
just to hang out with me.
Some of you don't even care
about Jane Austen I've discovered.
You just wanna hang out.
I love that.
And I feel like we can continue to hang out
while going in new directions
and taking new journeys together.
Now, what direction is that, you might be asking?
Well, I just have different ideas
for journeys I wanna take you guys on,
and attempting to get my health back on line
but also accomplished goals.
Like I mentioned earlier in this video
that I was writing a novel years ago.
I never got that published.
I got halfway through the editing process
and then I stopped.
So just like stuff like that.
Like I wanna keep working my novel
and go through attempting to get it published.
And I just wanna take you guys on that journey with me
and just other things like that.
I wanna learn Korean.
I wanna go to Korea.
I totally wanna take you guys with me to Korea,
which is something else.
Like I've been dreaming of going to Korea for years.
But then after I developed this relationship with you guys
on the internet,
now you guys factor into my dreams about it.
I'm like, "Then I can take them this place and that place."
And I feel like ultimately, I just wanna encourage people
to go after their dreams and take care of themselves
and have this positive impact on people.
And I think that's what I really wanna do with my channel,
which I think even with my videos on history and literature
has been an underlying aspect of it.
I remember months ago sitting down and writing like,
okay, what is my channel about?
I was trying to get a brand clarity.
Right?
I remember I wrote down
I wanted to make people happy.
And I realized that that on the very deep level
is what my channel's always been about for me.
And I feel like if I had told anyone that, it would be like,
"Well, Ellie your channel's about history and literature."
And I'd be like, "No.
In my head, it's about making people happy."
Whether that is making them happy
because they can understand their favorite books or movies
or they just enjoy watching the videos.
I just wanted to make people happy.
And I feel like this is just a further development
of that brand idea in my head of like,
I wanna make people's lives better.
I wanna be there as that friend
that's encouraging and inspiring.
Not that I'm very inspiring.
I can be like one person inspiring here.
Now you might be saying, "Okay, Ellie.
So does this mean that you're never gonna post
classic literature in history stuff?"
No, of course I am.
Because it is an interest I have.
I just wanna share a wider range of interests
and things with you,
but this is definitely something
that I am still interested in and will continue to share.
For example,
I'm totally planning on doing a review
of this new Persuasion movie coming out.
That needs to happen.
I'm just gonna intersperse that with my other content
because I wanna be able to research it
and enjoy it at a reasonable pace.
So it'll be coming out, just not all the time.
So of course I do know
that some of you guys might not be interested
in my new type of content coming out,
and you might feel like you need to unsubscribe.
And that is totally fine.
I completely understand.
It has been amazing having you here
as part of the community.
And I feel like maybe someday,
our digital paths will cross again.
But until that day comes,
keep being awesome because you're awesome.
But for those of you that wanna continue
on this interesting journey with me,
thank you for joining me on this path.
Just be prepared for the fact
that I don't really know what I'm doing.
I'm a newbie when it comes
to this lifestyle and vlogging stuff.
I was actually talking with my friends
about this the other day
about how obviously everyone's always horrible at stuff
when they try it for the first time, right?
Like when you're new to something,
you just have to accept the fact that it's gonna be awful
but that's how you learn and that's how you grow.
But then I also told my friends like,
"Yeah, that's true.
But most people don't have 86,000 people
watching them be horrible at something."
And that, my friends, is the magic of YouTube.
Being able to be horrible on a grand scale.
Never before seen.
But once again, while I wrap up this video,
I just wanna say thank you for being awesome and amazing.
And I'm not gonna cry about it again.
I'm almost did, but I'm not.
But you guys are awesome and amazing.
And yes, thank you for being with me here on this journey.
As always, keep being awesome because you guys are awesome.
Thank you.
Bye.
(cheerful classical music)