Raise your hand if you have many platforms (maybe way too many), where you’re trying to be creative. I, for example, have this blog, two Youtube channels, two Instagram accounts, two Twitter accounts, a Goodreads account… phew, is that all? Granted, I use Twitter mainly for sharing my videos and general chatting and I don’t stress too much about reviewing every single book I read on Goodreads but on the rest of them, I’m actually trying to do something and often failing at being consistent (or coherent haha) with it. And to be honest, it creates a low-key frustration at the back of my mind so today’s post is a bit of a ramble about my experience with creating on different platforms and why I haven’t totally abandoned this blog.

Creating Youtube videos is what excites me the most and it’s probably been the case since the beginning. I started my Booktube channel on 17 November 2017 and my lifestyle channel on 17 November 2020 (I didn’t even plan this!) and surprise surprise, I haven’t been always consistent with either of them. There were months when I uploaded more than once a week, and times when I took a break for several months.

But every time I stayed away from creating videos, I was still thinking about it, I was even still getting new ideas, and I missed it. Booktube is very community-oriented and I have found friends there, which means that it’s that much more important and precious to me. Even though my channel hasn’t grown that much so my motivation isn’t always super strong, I just couldn’t quit.

However, making videos is also the hardest and trickiest for me in several aspects. Sometimes it feels like the stars have to align perfectly well for me to actually film. “Shit, it’s already 4 pm so I’m out of daylight.” “I don’t have the filming energy today.” “I should probably wash my hair first or just do it tomorrow.”

Some of my reasons for not filming are valid, some less so but the fact is that it requires way more mental and physical energy (and ideally some other circumstantial requirements like decent lighting and acceptable level of noise from running appliances and the neighbors, etc.) than say, typing this post. And being someone for whom the whole bones/no bones day is a bit more than just a joke, the physical and energy-level accessibility of creating for a specific platform plays a big role for me.

Sometimes I upload a video and I want to utilize the creative momentum and boost it gives me but there’s not that much to do in this regard during low-energy moments or days. I can plan my next videos or maybe learn how to improve the thumbnails etc. but the most important part is to get the video filmed. (I have planned a lot of videos that I never end up filming…) And if we’re talking about taking photos for Instagram, that’s luckily much less energy-consuming (plus it doesn’t matter how I look because I’m usually not in them) but again, you need at least decent lighting so there are some limitations as well.

So that’s one of the things I really like about blogging. I’m only talking about my experience with the creative process and my specific circumstances but for me, blogging is the easiest and most doable and something I can do even on very low-energy days. I can write a few sentences here and there whenever I have the time and pick it up again without any special prep. I could even dictate a blog post to my phone while on a walk (which I’ve never done but I love that it’s a possibility). I can also write during my commute (ok this is probably not going to happen very often). Typing thoughts is easy enough but at the same time, it works well as a creative outlet and it makes me feel good and productive.

(Obviously, blogging has its own challenges and there are things you need to take care of that you don’t need to do yourself on other platforms or that other platforms make easier for you (technical stuff, graphics, promoting the content, building a community…) so in no way am I saying that running a blog and posting consistently is generally easier than existing on some other platform or that it’s inferior to other types of content.)

Blogs are not the hottest form of content anymore but there are still so many amazing bloggers now and new ones starting every day (probably). And I really love having my own corner of the internet that is truly mine (because I pay for it). With Youtube, Instagram, and other places, we might feel like the accounts are ours but we are still only guests there, their policies and rules change all the time, and things can go simply very wrong there. Blogs are not completely danger-free zones either but you have so much more control when it’s your own website.

Admittedly, my blogging is a bit of a mess right now. I started with a vision of writing about personal development, life organization, and other topics I’m interested in. At first, I didn’t want to include books here but reading is a big part of my life so they found their way here as well. I have many interests so niching down hasn’t happened for me apart from my bookish socials. I also get more perfectionist tendencies with my blog than with my Youtube channel. If I film something, it usually gets uploaded but I’ve started many blog posts that I never finished and published because I felt like they weren’t interesting enough. Of course, being confused about what I even should or want to post here and in which direction the blog should go didn’t help either.

So basically I don’t know what I’m doing but maybe it’s ok for now? If I want to become more consistent, maybe not worrying about things being good enough is a good first step. I don’t want to be scared of being honest in my own online space. And if I wait for some magical time when I have everything completely figured out, I could be waiting for a long time.

I’m curious about your thoughts and experience – do you find some types of creating easier than others? Have you considered quitting and why did you decide the way you did?