Unmotivated -> Showing up -> Gaining Confidence.
I share what's been bothering me for the past while...life update...unmotivated to showing up on TikTok and Twitch to slowly gaining confidence.
Hey.
I’ve been unmotivated for some time now to the point of where I haven’t produced my regular wrestling podcasting content. I have no idea what happened to all my motivation, my ambition, and drive to create so much content. I had things planned. I wrote them down. And suddenly, all that energy isn’t there anymore.
Maybe it was because I wrote down everything, saw it all, and got subconsciously overwhelmed that turned into huge procrastination and self-doubt.
HOWEVER! This is where, I believe wholeheartedly that the brain is weird. Even if I may feel/think that above, I decided to turn my focus to TikTok and Twitch Streams and the occasional Twitter Spaces with Gabe Sapolsky. I also turned my focus and attention on getting more sales for my wrestling planner - One More Match and a Valentines Day journal. I sold a total of 9 copies of the wrestling planner One More Match.
Because I’ve turned my attention to TikTok and Twitch, I feel like I show up to those and it’s bringing back my confidence. In all of this, I somehow lost my confidence.
Every Tuesday at around 4pm est is Tape Study Tuesdays. We watch wrestler matches or wrestling matches and I give critiques about it.
I love teaching about wrestling and helping wrestlers. I love teaching the viewers, fans, and friends that show up to the twitch streams and we have a party. On any other given day, I’ll talk about wrestling news, wrestling shows, and we’ll catch up on New Japan Pro Wrestling.
Over on TikTok, I’m building confidence on creating 3 min wrestling videos. That is super difficult. I’m growing over there. The goal is to gain 1k friends so I can go live on TikTok and provide them with a different version of my twitch livestreams. My knowledge on pro wrestling has been unmatched over at TikTok that now I’m acknowledged by the content creators.
Other than that, my mind has been filled by the following thoughts:
How will I pay for Norton Anti-Virus yearly bill for next month?
a. Norton anti-virus keeps all my electronics going and free of viruses. My laptop is my money maker, my access to streaming, creating, and more. I would be subject to viruses and my love of creating entertainment for everyone would be gone. I’ve been streaming steadily as of late to increase AD revenue with some occasional free twitch prime subs coming in to help boost that. But twitch revenue isn’t always a guarantee. But it still bothers my mind. The bill is $136.08.If I already added my thoughts and two cents about a wrestling topic or a mini review on TikTok, would anyone care about a full-length podcast episode about that?
a. I made a stitch on TikTok explaining that Bray Wyatt isn’t overrated. He cannot be overrated because he’s yet to be so widely loved like a Kenny Omega. Bray Wyatt is loved but not super loved. Wrestling fans didn’t like the sponsored wrestling match by Mountain Dew during the WWE Royal Rumble called: Pitch Black Match. It was cool to watch, and I knew it wasn’t my type of match, but I enjoyed it. Wrestling reviewers think that wrestling should be tailored to their specific enjoyment while still saying that wrestling is subjective.I want to take care of my health, but I’m worried about not being part of the conversation sometimes.
a. There’s a shift on twitter and I’m not liking it. I won’t be purchasing twitter for a blue checkmark, and this means I would have to work harder for my twitter posts to be seen. The TikTok algorithm is all about producing videos 24/7 to stay relevant. I tend to do a bunch back to back and upload and leave it there to get good views on the videos. But that takes a lot of energy. Twitch Livestreams take effort because I may not get wrestling fans all the time and I don’t like bothering my podcasting buddies to join because I know they are working. Livestreams take energy too.
Let’s chat about the future for a bit.
I changed the title of the publication from Squared Circle Info to Squared Circle Society. I decided to focus more on a community-based publication. I’ve been searching for answers to my demotivation. I’ve been brainstorming ideas on how to improve my overall approach to create an engaging discussion with my community. Basically, I’ve been learning about how to create a healthy thriving community that doesn’t waste your time because most if not all works and have lives outside of wrestling.
For me, wrestling is my life. Wrestling is 24/7 for me. And it’s my livelihood and income.
I want to do more. And let’s be honest, who here has downloaded the Substack Chat app? I’ve used it and added some threads in there. I participate in Substack’s own thread just to get my name and this publication out there.
Someone suggested we can do a live chat about Monday Night RAW. However, I know that I won’t be able to keep up with that because I like to watch the shows more than live summary chat about it. Substack Chat is a way to have conversational threads about anything but should be used to further discussions on content or ask new questions about topics in wrestling.
Are you interested in using the Substack Chat over something, let’s say a Discord Server?
I will say that Substack Chat is very limited. A Discord Server will give more flexibility in discussions. But it’s up to you guys. Please reply with a comment.
I’ve taken steps to create a Patreon to house my exclusive Tape Study Tuesday’s sessions based on 70s and 80s old school international wrestling breakdowns/reviews. It’ll be similar to what I do on a regular Tuesday.
Substack will remain the place for wrestling news, wrestling articles, podcasts, and my fiction writing.
I’ve noticed some things over the course of this Substack journey:
I was granted the ability to upload videos. Upload videos and the watch time falls very fast or even barely existent. No one watches videos in email.
My free podcast episodes do well in downloads.
Anything paid, behind a paywall, doesn’t do well.
I would love to incorporate the wrestling reaction videos as a paid perk but I’ve noticed that emails that are super content creative like mine don’t do well like a Patreon, a regular website, or some other form of social media.
Substack’s strongest strength is writing. Podcasting is strong too but I can turn this post into a podcast so you can listen rather than read it. To me, personally, that’s not a podcast.
I always want to be honest with you guys.
Going forward, I’ll be using Substack, Twitter, Patreon, TikTok, Twitch, and maybe creating a Discord for flexibility. It all depends on who’s down for it. Of course, I’ll gather more community members along the way, but I’m asking and telling you guys all this because you are my day 1s.
Your input matters to me.
And this feels damn good to write it all down. I’m a little nervous as to what kind of reaction I’ll get or the replies.
Listen, I love you guys. When I started this, we hit the ground running, now I’m trying to climb back. I want to break my old habits like just dropping press releases and how I present wrestling news without burning myself out or overthinking to make a healthy discourse on the topic presented. You know?
I’ll get back on the grind. Thanks for being patient with me. Thanks for the continuous support. Content creation is lonely. Content creation is energy exhausting. Supporting others on their content creation journey’s is exhausting too. I am proud of them.
I am proud of you guys too.
Thank you for reading all this.
Love you.
Marie