I want to live a life where I give myself permission

I started posting videos with the feeling that I had no other options

Last spring, my beloved dog, whom I had rescued and lived with for eight years, passed away, and a while later, I welcomed a new puppy into my home.
However, living with a dog costs a fair amount of money.

“Maybe I can at least have them earn their own keep.”

Triggered by that naive idea, I started producing videos and posting them on YouTube that autumn.

In the past, I had even written articles about equipment.

Since I started last September, it has been exactly one year.

I wanted to quit many times before that, but I kept going.

In the beginning, it was just the thought, “If I’m nearing fifty and can’t even have hope for my current company, then I have no choice but to aim for revenue with this (video posting).”

Even with pet videos, which are said to be easy to continue and grow, that didn’t come true.

After a year, I have 170 channel subscribers.
It’s amazing to think I have 170 fans, but when aiming for revenue, this growth rate is, honestly speaking, a tough number.

I was afraid to give up
Usually, it is recommended to post 2-3 times a week for a while after opening a channel.

As expected, that was impossible.
I’m not single, and I work full-time. I also have to do housework.
Even though there was a period where I managed to keep up with one post a week,
someone who has “achieved” something would probably still call that “lazy.”

I am a natural quitter, and I have challenged myself with many things, from studying for certifications to blog affiliate marketing, but none of them lasted.

I’m full of motivation at first, but before I know it, I stop working on them.

Seeing the texts and equipment lying dormant without being given a proper place to shine feels like looking at myself in a mirror—someone who buys things and is satisfied just with that—and it feels like my heart is being gouged out. I hate that version of myself.

That is why I continued posting for a year, solely out of the desire not to see that version of myself again.

Quitting was scary.
I was afraid of being forced to face myself again, buying something, doing it a little bit, achieving nothing, and ending it.

It felt like admitting that the videos were also a failure, and it wasn’t that I didn’t have any desire to keep the equipment on hand, but in the end, I sold it at a flea market on impulse.
I managed to quit.

Quitting is not a step backward

If I quit videos, what can I do?
I even had such desperate thoughts.

However, I kept facing my inner self.

“Do I really like making videos?”

Searching for oneself in one’s late forties might be ridiculous.
However, it is a fact that at this age, there are still things I don’t know about what I like and what I dislike.

Quitting is not a step backward.
It just means I’ve learned one more thing that I’m “not suited for” or that I “don’t find interesting.”

The "I must" disease is scary

Looking back, I feel like I have been possessed by thoughts of "this is how it should be" or "I must do this" ever since I can remember.
I used to believe that there was a correct answer to everything.
I even thought that if I just looked up the answers and pushed forward toward them, I could be happy.

However, the world is actually full of things that are unclear and unknown.
It might have been quite a long time after becoming an adult that I realized it was impossible to keep seeking clear answers to everything.

In fact, there is a psychological term called "ambiguity tolerance," and it seems OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, looks for ambiguity tolerance in its designers.

It's easier and more tempting to have a clear answer, like in a cult, isn't it?
Once you convince yourself that you "must" do something, you can just charge ahead without thinking about anything else.

Naturally, just because I made a video doesn't mean I have to post it on YouTube, and it's not like I absolutely have to make a profit from it either.
It sounds like such an obvious thing, though.

Make "I don't have to" a habit

Well, I say this myself,
but having spent a childhood where I was always expected to be perfect, I never dreamed that the majority of things in the world are things I don't actually have to do.

Since I stopped making YouTube videos and have extra time again, for some reason, I bought a textbook for a certification called "IT Passport" and am reading it.

The trigger was that my husband's PC started getting the blue screen more often, so when I did a clean install, I looked up how to back up data and how to extract data from the saved Windows Image Backup one by one.

At that time, I felt it might be good to learn it systematically for once, so I bought the textbook, but if it were the old me, I think I would have been dominated by the thought, "I bought the textbook, so I absolutely have to pass!"

"I just want to study it systematically, and well, I'll take the exam if I can..."

With that kind of feeling, once I gave myself permission, strangely enough, I feel like I can study.

Thinking that it might have been like this all along, I can't help but feel I've lost out on a lot.
But just being able to have that realization is progress in life, right?