Being a Content Creator whether you’re a YouTuber creating Videos, a Streamer on TwitchTV/Mixer, and more. It can all come at a cost but not with your wallet. But with your Physical and Mental Health. It should not be ignored; you need to take care of yourself and prevent the burnout because it’s all too real.
Being a Content Creator can be incredible demanding, it all depends how much you are dedicated and passionate for. Great Content requires passion and dedication for your craft, but it also takes a lot of time working on it. Let’s look at a Youtuber for example, they need to not only plan out what games they want to play, but also record, edit, render, upload, and then promote and market their content. That’s if everything goes to plan, sometimes you need to re-edit a video because of an editing mistake, re-render a video because it failed to render, maybe even throw out a record because it wasn’t up to your standards. There is a lot of things that can go wrong. Let’s look at a Streamer, they have to plan out what they want to play and figure out will this game get more potential viewers to their stream? Also, they have to ensure they’re overlays and alerts are working, their equipment including microphones and website is all set, and pray their Internet or PC decides to stop working. Sometimes they’re internet goes down and cannot stream, sometimes their PC is acting up, sometimes they make mistakes that will cost them hugely. People need to understand that A LOT can go wrong trying to maintain and achieve higher quality content.
Let’s look at the Physical aspect of things, it can take A LOT of energy to record/stream content because of your Persona but also takes energy to editing, figuring things out, and more. People think that Streaming or Recording content can be easy, it’s not. People put in A LOT of energy making their streams and videos more enjoyable. People can be recording videos for content for 4-8hours per day and streamers can stream on average at least 4-8 hours per day. It’s honestly basically a full-time job at times. And its even worst because that are many Content Creators working full time jobs of 40 hours or more a week. So, when they create content its only adding more pressure and draining their system even more. I do admit I feel a little jealous when there are Content Creators out there that don’t work full-time, etc. because it means they can put more concentration and effort while those of us are trying to keep at it. And that’s just creating the content, there is still promoting and marketing their content. Which can be Social Media posts, attending local events, or going to Conventions to promote their Channels/Brands. Take time to relax the body, do Yoga, play a sport, get up and take a nice walk or jog. Make sure you get enough sleep each day, atleast 6 hours a day to help re-charge the body. Remember to keep hydrated and ensure you get enough Vitamins and nutrients each day to help keep your body going.
Now something equally or even more important is Mental Health. I’m not going to lie Content Creating can be an incredibly stressful hobby/job to do. This passionate hobby/job that Content Creators have is a 2-Sided coin. You always see the glamour of the popular Content Creators, or the Rising Stars, etc. But you never see the costs of it, the pain we go through, the stress we endure, and the breakdowns we have. I’m not going to lie when I say I thought about out right stopping Content Creating because of the added stress in my life. I have seen my friends as Content Creators stopping it due to Drama effecting their Mental Health. The problem is that Content Creators need to take a break and slow down at times. People think streaming for 6-8 hours plus day after day or creating 2-3 videos on YouTube day after day is the only way to succeed and its not. Quality over quantity every time so people will make a lot of content stressing out to only find it didn’t do much to add. Listen, you need to have days off being a Content Creator, you need to take Vacations, if you need a Personal Day off take it. Your Mental Health is highly important and sadly there have been Content Creators doing a lot of things that self-harm themselves to coop with the issues.
I think people wanting be Content Creators have this idea that they are destined for greatness, or they will achieve the status of the most popular creators. Content Creating is becoming incredibly populated with so many Creators out there, which means a lot more competition to go up against because at the end of the day there are those that are going to rise, those that stagnate, and those that won’t get anywhere. It’s the norm of being a Content Creator, not everyone is going to be successful like Markiplier or Pewdiepie on YouTube. Or Streamers like Ninja, Shroud, or Anne Munition. You have to keep yourself grounded so if your video didn’t get you the views you think it would get, or the stream didn’t get many viewers you won’t feel more worst than need be. This market is always changing, what’s the next big game going to be to showcase, what indie game is going to get a spotlight that you can ride in on, what content creators can I network with that will be a healthy friendship and relationship with content. More time and effort to put in for a gamble of success.
People will always see the success of major Content Creators for YouTube videos and Streamers for TwitchTV/Mixer. But they don’t see the costs that it took to get them there. They don’t see the costs of physical/mental pain they endure every day to keep at it. Content Creators need to take things slow and pace themselves. They need to take time off for themselves with days off, take a week or two long plus vacation, etc. Its ok to take a break, there are many Content Creators out there including myself that need it. Its our life, we only get one shot at this so let’s make sure we don’t need to keep adding the stress in our lives even more.