tldr: ask yourself these 3 questions and reflect on your answers:

• Why are you creating content?

• Are you enjoying the process of content creation?

• What do you expect from your content creation?

As the first post of the blog, I want to start with the main reason in starting this blog in the first place, which is - "what can I do to make myself feel good / happy / meaningful / content as a content creator". Everything below is purely sharing from my limited experience in content creation in gaming, but I hope that some of you may find this useful, and it may give you a new prespective on what it means to be a content creator.

A bit of background about myself first. I am an ex-professor who have always been interested in gaming and have consume a lot of content from gaming content creators in multiple formats over the years. As I was taking a break from my career as a professor, I found myself spending a lot of time playing games. Content creation has always been at the back of my mind, but I never overcame the barrier of starting it until one random day I decided to look into how to start streaming on Twitch. Within an hour or two, I installed all the software I needed, and just clicked the "Start streaming" button. I will cover more about my journey into content creation in another post. Long story short, I started with streaming on Twitch a few months ago, then started a Youtube channel not long after, and now I am starting a blog sharing my experiences in gaming.

Below are some of my reflections on "how to be content" (pun intended) throughout my journey as a starting content creator.

1. Reflect on why you are creating content

There were times during the start of my journey in content creation when I found myself just start streaming because I felt that I need to, or I felt the need to make a Youtube video because there was some big news I wanted to cover. At some point, I asked myself - "what am I achieving in doing content creation?", or another way to put it would be - "why am I creating content?".

Be clear on why you are create the content that you are creating is, I belive, one of the most important factors in being content as a content creator. If you are seeing a purpose / value in what you are doing, it should give you some satisfaction knowing that what you are doing means something.

For me, I am creating content because I enjoy doing it. At this point, content creation is a hobby for me and I am not relying on content creation to support my living. For some of you, content creation may be your part-time or even full-time job, and this makes it even more important for you to think about the value of whatever content you are creating. Remind yourself about your audience and what you think the audience will gain from your content. 

2. Figure out what content you enjoy creating (or not)

There are so many different types of content out there - say different media - do you enjoy streaming? or making videos? or writing blogs? or creating websites / tools? What do you want your audience to get out of from your content? - entertainment? educational? in-depth analysis? news? It is important to find the right medium for the type of content that you enjoy creating.

For me, as an ex-professor, I enjoy creating educational content. I started off streaming on Twitch, and after awhile I realised it is not the best platform for educational content and so I gradually shifted my focus to making Youtube videos. I found it more enjoyable as I have more time to think about what to include in my videos. Now I am starting this blog because I realised there are content that are more suitable in text compared to video format. Different people enjoy creating content in different media, so just choose the media that you enjoy most, especially if your main goal is to have fun and enjoy process.

3. Managing expectations

How happy / content you are depends a lot on your expectations. Some people would be very happy to hit 100 subscribers while others might be stressed about getting their one millionth subscribers. As for most things in life, it is all about expectations. The key to contentment is to have no expectations. If you have no expectations, you will not have disappointment. Of course it is easier said than done. One way is to start is to change your expectations to something one can control. Rather than chasing number of views, which is not under your control, try turning to something more internal, say I would like to enjoy the process of making a video to share about something I am passionate in.

If your goal is to have a sense of achievement, you can try setting different levels of expectations, some big ones and some smalls ones. Having multiple milestones help with getting a sense of achievement but do note that the chase for sense of achievement potentially comes with stress, anxiety, and disappointment. I personally prefer contentment over happiness but it is a personal preference which may change as time goes by.

To end, let me share my answers to the 3 questions in the tldr.

• I am creating content because I wanted to try it out and see if I enjoy it, and I feel like my content may help someone out there who watch my videos or read my posts. I like the helping people in that way.
• Sometimes I get excited when I have some ideas of what content I want to make. But there were times the project I had in mind got too big and I felt stressed because I felt the need to finish it even though I may not have the time to. But overall I enjoy the process of making my videos and writing this blog post but I also found out that streaming may not be for me.
• I really try to make no expectations. It is fine if no one watches my videos and read this post. I started off chasing views and followers on Twitch but it often results in disappointment, so I have learnt to not look at numbers and just enjoy talking and playing the game while I stream.

I hope this has been helpful. Do feel free to share your thoughts and experiences in the comments!

P.S. For those who are curious, here are the links to my Twitch and Youtube channel.

Twitch: https://twitch.tv/mauriceccy

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@maurice_ccy