I'm tired, you're tired; now what? Letting go of things that no longer serve us

The struggle is real

People seem to be posting less lately. Or maybe it's the vagaries of "the algorithm." But either way, I think we're getting to the 'pointy end' of the year and some of us are clearly feeling it.

• Lynnaire Johnston wrote about the "Christmas crawl."
• Said Saddouk tells us he's too exhausted for too much text.

I'm tired too, of course, but I am always tired. Parts of my body ache for seemingly no reason. Every day is 'blursday.' The same handful of problems are always problems. I don't really know what to tell you.

My theory about life, generally, is that (for most of us) it's a marathon, not a sprint. You really need to pace yourself.

And it would be very glib of me to say something like "rest when you need to" without understanding the nuances of your situation, but honestly just do what you can.

I think, especially for new content creators, a lot of mental energy can be expended not just through the creation of the content itself, but also the "are my views/comments/likes worth the effort?" mental acrobatics.

I am definitely not immune to this.

I guess it might be useful at this point for me to revisit my own principles.

1. Every time I go live or write or speak, I'm building my Presentation Muscle.
2. Every time I create something new, I'm creating a new entry point into my world that someone might find. (We don't talk enough about the power of a meaningful back catalogue!)
3. You don't need to be perfect, you just need to show up.
4. Consistency is useful, but if you need to take a break, do so.

Tech, Tools, Strategies: Letting go of things that no longer serve us

I am such a creature of habit. If I found something that works for me, I'll stick with it for a really time. Occasionally this will mean I will hold onto an approach for a little bit too long.

What is true of modern life is that change is constant. Sometimes you'll change, sometimes the context in which you find yourself changes, and sometimes external factors (that you don't have any control over) change.

Routine can be comforting. But it can also be boring.

I don't recommend people jump from thing to thing, necessarily. Shiny Object Syndrome is real and it can be a problem. But equally don't cut off other possibilities. Again, with most things in life, the answer is somewhere in the messy middle.

• Sometimes things will stop working or break or just become unreliable. I've loved the ASIO plugin for OBS Studio. It allowed me to bring in individual tracks from my Rodecaster Pro as individual audio sources in OBS Studio. But the truth is it just stops working from time to time, often mid-stream, which was what happened last week, and that was the final nail in the coffin for me. (Equally this week we're trying Things by Ping (Ping.gg) to see if we can overcome some of the quality issues we've experienced with VDO Ninja.)
• Sometimes companies change ownership and new ownership changes things further. This could be software like StreamYard, or a social media platform like X or Twitter. Honestly I don't have much to say about either of these examples, except to note that I use them much less these days.
• Sometimes life will through you a curve ball. It's no secret that my co-host Sam Proof lost his former home to a fire and that this profoundly impacted his ability to do the foster kitten care and streaming that he had done previously through CuteAvalanche . He'll talk about how he has changed his approach on this week's show.
• Sometimes you just need to change your relationship to something you're doing. Sometimes you need to have more fun. I try to be super focussed when I do a live show. But recently I started re-doing the "Coffee and Content" streams in a more informal way. Just me chatting, sipping coffee and trying to learn new things. It's been a while since I've had an opportunity to really learn something new. I've started trying to teach myself DaVinci Resolve, and in particular the Fusion tab, and this has been energising.

Join us live

Check out the event links for the date and time in your local time zone.

I hope you'll join us!

• Letting go of tech, tools and strategies that no longer serve us (watch on YouTube)
• Letting go of tech, tools and strategies that no longer serve us (watch on LinkedIn?)

Wrangling DaVinci Resolve continues

I'm really enjoying trying to teach myself DaVinci Resolve.

My focus right now is to create live stream assets that I can use in OBS Studio.

So far I've created:

• A 'Like & Subscribe' overlay;
• An animated promotional banner.

I intend to go live at the same time this week, though I haven't scheduled it yet so keep an eye out either here on LinkedIn? or over at YouTube.

Have a great week!

Have a great week. Do what you need to do to look after yourself!

Remember, if you're interested in video, livestreaming and content creation:

• Connect with me here on LinkedIn?.
• Subscribe to the Learn Livestreaming channel on YouTube. (Currently 573 subscribers! THANK YOU! Woohoo it won't be too long until I hit 600. How should we celebrate? ??)
• Follow JohnLacey.com for even more content.

BONUS: OBS Studio Tips & Tricks

Watch "OBS Tips & Tricks" on YouTube

Last week on The Video and Livestreaming Show, we spoke about some of our favourite OBS Studio tips and tricks.