Happy Holidays everyone! Sorry for not posting last Monday as my friend was admitted into Hospice.
As I moved to a more healthy attitude towards streaming, with one of the major goals being to improve streaming, I looked up articles on how to be more entertaining. Strangely, it was hard to find actionable steps to follow. While also researching how to be a better streamer, there were articles about how to be successful in streaming, which tend to be having a set schedule and such.
Upon internet search about more global definitions of how to achieve success, Dr. Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People came up time and time again. In college, I did all the exercises in the book, and it really helped me to be a better person, the person that I'd like to be back then. Yes, I even did those grid exercises and followed them to the letter.
I revisited the book as a now middle-aged adult, and my heart sank because I just didn't have the energy to do even the first thought exercise, which is envisioning yourself at your funeral, and what you'd like your loved ones to say about you.
At this point, because I'm so fatigued and tired, I thought, "I really don't care if all they said was that Alice loved video games". I then envisioned my friends looking into my casket (though I prefer to be cremated) with the Xbox One Elite controller in my hands, and Dark Souls Remastered as well as my other favorite video games and consoles surrounding me. Lastly, an effigy of Extreme Behemoth (my most hated boss of all time) being burned at the end of the funereal proceedings.
The next exercise made my heart sink even further as you're to write your mission statement. That was very overwhelming as there doesn't seem to be concrete guidelines that Covey offers, though he gave sample mission statements. However, I remember I wrote a mission statement back in college - if only I could find it!
Looking at the still unpacked boxes of books and various papers, my heart sank yet again, as my house is very disorganized. I thought if I could just organize things, I could find that mission statement, saving me the work of having to write it again.
Searching for books upon organization, the KonMarie system kept coming up, and reading the reviews of her book on Amazon, Kondo's The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, made me laugh because a lot of the readers who followed her system had the same feelings as me. That we wished our homes would accidentally burn to the ground (of course, with no one getting hurt), so that we can start from square one. However, they noted that they achieved success following her system, so I bought the book.
It's a very amusing book, and made me laugh at Kondo's attempts, since age 5 years old, to hone in on methods that lead to permanent organization, as she noted the past traditional but flawed strategies of tidying inevitably descents into disorganization.
I feel that so far, her methods make a lot of sense and she delves very deeply into why her methods work, as opposed to past tidying "truisms". I'm 3/4 of the way through the book around the section of how to go about folding clothes. If I ever have the energy to organize using the KonMarie method, I'll certainly blog about it. Like with all structured programs, there are caveats to her book, such as her warning to not wear comfortable sweatpants as loungewear.
This contradicts the whole tome of the book, as it's about finding what brings you joy. What brings me joy is to be able to come home in a neat, organized, beautiful space that's functional and has all my favorite things. I change into my comfie sweatpants and t-shirt (100% cotton that prevents welts and rash), rather than flouncy lingerie that invariably tends to be an unfortunate blend of silk and polyester that scratches and abrades the skin. Even if pure silk, the dry cleaning process causes massive hives.
At any rate, because of my tiredness, feeling that Covey's and KonMarie methods are out of reach, I decided to read Viktor Frankl's Man's Search For Meaning (Covey frequently alludes to his work), for the second time in my life. The first time again was when I was in college. I completely agree with everyone's views that you should read this book at least once in your life.
I appreciate Frankl's work because it doesn't take physical or immense mental energy. In fact Dr. Frankl mentions that you can't write your life's mission in one fell swoop. His analogy is that it's like watching the frames of a movie, you don't know what the movie is about until you watch the whole thing. In other words, you can find meaning right now without coming up with a life plan!
What else is refreshing is that the meaning you find will change from situation to situation, moment to moment, and it's your unique and personal journey to find your own meaning. So, there's no tortured formula to follow.
Further, one thinks that given Dr. Frankl's will power, integrity and moral character, that you can only find meaning in extraordinary situations. Rather, he notes that you can find meaning in very simple things such as helping others, loving another person, experiencing beauty such as art, the outdoors and the like, and even hobbies such as video games, which still has the stigma of being considered frivolous time-wasters. I very much appreciate this very lack of elitism that Frankl espouses.
Indeed, we've come full circle, finding the meaning of streaming, which I strongly feel will not only prevent burn-out, but lead to joy. This is success in its own right. If you find streaming meaningful, you'll look forward to it, even when you're tired. Streaming for me is meaningful because of the personal connections I have with my wonderful community, truly remarkable people who helped me improve my life, challenge myself and grow.
Streaming condensed how I approached things in a very short time frame, over a few months. Every time I start a project, I tend to be overly gung-ho that leads to burn-out and quitting. Overly gung-ho in that I push myself to be "successful" in the artificial sense of the word such as having the magic 75 concurrent viewers to become Twitch partner. And doing as much as possible to achieve that type of "success".
I finally came to the realization of what streaming means to me after my friend was diagnosed with a grave illness, and woke up to reality. It was so easy to recognize that this artificial sense of success is bogus, misleading, and even hurtful. As a result, I was finally able to let go of these Twitch cultural expectations that are so highly in-grained in the field, "the dream is to stream" for a living is a meme.
Certainly, the holidays (and, for that matter, any day) are a wonderful time to explore meaning in your life.
TL/DR: Finding meaning will lead to success.
