I’m fairly certain I’m not alone in the fact that I am constantly attempting to balance what I enjoy doing, with what I am more or less forced to do. Just being a human is expensive. Paying for rent, fuel, utilities, food, etc. isn’t cheap, not to mention trying to be responsible by having health insurance, investing money for my future, and looking into purchasing a house. Life isn’t cheap. So naturally I’m forced to be working in a job that pays my bills.
I’m lucky enough to have a job that I thoroughly enjoy. Every job likely has negatives and mine is no exception, but despite the downsides I enjoy being around the people I work with, and using my creativity in order to tell stories that help people. Not everyone can say they get up in the morning happy about the job they will be going to that day, and I do not take that for granted in any way. However…
While I love my work, and love having creative freedom in that work, there’s a part of me that isn’t totally fulfilled by it. This lack of fulfillment seems to be addressed in the other things I do with my time. Some people would call them a hobby, some may consider it a side hustle. I think of it as more of the life I’m striving to build for myself. Making a conscious effort to build a life of freedom for myself. Freedom to create exactly what I am inspired to create rather than being given an assignment. Freedom to not be tied to a single location.
This is where the balancing comes in. Trying to balance making YouTube videos and taking landscape photos with the meetings, events, and assignments for work is no easy task. Consistency on YouTube is not easy in and of itself, but to try to maintain that while also fulfilling all my duties at work makes it even more stressful.
I’m not sure there’s any good way to balance the two without working yourself into burnout. Obviously, there are a few tricks and strategies involved in making it a bit easier. For instance, I often plan out what videos I will make each month at the beginning of the month. That way if I have an especially busy week at work I can prepare for that by record and editing my video for that week ahead of time. But sometimes that’s not even enough, because after long hours at work sometimes the last thing I want to do is put on a presentable face and point a camera at myself.
I really don’t have an answer… I don’t know what to do. An obvious way to get rid of this strife is by quitting my job and focusing solely on YouTube. But I’m nowhere near being able to make that financially feasible, so the job stays. I just have to be conscious of my time and what I spend my hours working on, and likely have to accept the fact that I have to work day and night, weekdays and weekends, for months - and maybe years - to be able to balance these things successfully.
Thumbnail photo: Matt Van Swol (2017)