Whether you know it or not:

You have some barriers that are holding you back from reaching your highest potential.

And especially during content creation, those unknown flaws can make big damage.

If you have any of the following:

• not feeling like your content is that great

• varying content quality

• lack of motivation

• no persistence

• little passion

then it’s caused by some underlying issues and misguided beliefs.

But don’t worry! Like anything, they can be changed - often through simple refocusing.

So, let’s go ahead and start.

I’ll be giving you each problem in detail and a way to fix the issue right afterwards.

X things holding you back (and how to fix them):

1. Addiction to Stimulation

Stimulation doesn’t just mean

• playing videogames all day

• binging series after series

While those are forms of it, it can be way sneakier.

One unknown one is constantly having earworms.

I know I personally have songs stuck in my head for hours daily on some days.

And another one for me has been constantly rewatching the video I’ve made so far - leading to little progress.

Here’s how to notice it in yourself and other people:

If you’re

• watching video after video

• constantly shaking your leg or arms

• scrolling down the Twitter timeline for hours

, you’re likely addicted to stimulation.

Now, like any addiction, you gotta unhook yourself.

Whether you wanna completely quit or limit it, it’s gonna be highly effective.

So, here’s how to solve it:

The first and biggest solution is to stop relying on it.

Detach from having to feel good all the time. Realize, that boredom and even negative feelings are just as normal and not to be demonized.

And in fact, this will make you feel free!

Because you allow yourself to just be satisfied with what you have.

And in Content Creation, you’ll start seeing some huge improvements in productivity.

When I started applying this, I went from making 3 seconds of a video per day to 10-30!

And with Tweets, I write them in 1/3 of the time.

Now, a few warnings:

A: Stimulation does not mean doing what you genuinely love. This does not mean you should stop pursuing your passion. Stimulation is completely different from delayed Gratification and constant Fulfillment (what your passion is).

B: You should still be productive with your work, but allow yourself some unstimulated time. Lay around, meditate, do some research.

C: Too quick changes can be unsustainable and you’ll end up stimulating yourself harder than before. Unhook yourself from good feelings first before you start removing bad habits.

If you manage that, you already unhook yourself from that trap (to some extent).

What does this mean for your content?

You can start to genuinely become passionate about it.

I know I was making some videos quickly to stimulate myself, but now I take my time to make 1 passion project instead of 4 good ones.

Unaddicting yourself from Stimulation will do so much good!

2. Focusing on the wrong Values

This is something pretty much everyone does.

I recently made a list of my Top 10 Values and realized something:

I was pursuing Humor, my 8th highest value way more with videos than my top 3.

I focused on making my videos funny, but what satisfied me most was making something genuinely amazing.

So, I’ve set my focus on those, rather than Humor.

And I’ve noticed myself be so much more fulfilled with my work.

Now, you may know your Top 10 values, you may not.

If you want to figure them out, along with your Life Purpose (the work you want to pursue), I highly recommend taking Actualized.Org’s Life Purpose Course.

It costs 249$ and it’s extremely worth it. Check out this page and you’ll see if you’re interested.

But even if you’re not, you can at least determine it by gut feeling.

Even before that course, I was always aligned with most of my Top 10 Values.

So - ask yourself: When do I feel most satisfied? Focusing on what aspect of my work is most fulfilling? What do I always love following?

That alone can make you figure out the direction you wanna take with your content. If you find your own content boring or not that fulfilling, it’s likely because you aren’t aligned with your top values.

Now, know that even when you pursue your top values, you can still be unsatisfied and still struggle to fully do it.

But that’s inner resistance. When you do what you love most, your mind always resists a bit. Know and pursue your main values and stop picking instant gratification and lower values over it.

Trust me - the difference is huge!

3. Irrational fear

These are any of the following:

• fearing some random person as dangerous

• thinking, people are watching you

• fearing the grade you’ll get

Basically, any short-term fears that keep reappearing.

Why are they so bad?

A: They distract you from following your work fully.

B: They unnecessarily make you unhappier in life, unable to experience peace.

I know this was one of my biggest struggles for ages, and I’m still working on fixing it.

It used to be so bad that I didn’t wanna leave the house most of the time.

Now, there are a couple of solutions.

Some of them will make your life easier in the moment, others will fix the problem at its root cause.

1. Reminding yourself your fears are irrational

Think back:

In all the cases you had those fears - how many times did they actually come true?

I can bet it was very little.

How many times did you get that terrible grade you feared?

How many times did that stranger actually attack you?

Even if it did happen, the turnout is probably extremely low.

So, what helps is to take a moment and repeat to yourself that it won’t happen.

And even if it does, you know how to deal with it.

When your mind is this attached to survival, it helps to just tell it that everything will be fine.

But, again, this is only a short-term solution.

2. Face them head on

This will help soothe the fears at least a little bit.

I used to be terrified of any kind of public speaking or action.

Then I participated in a talent show and 2 school president elections - and now I’ve pretty much lost that fear.

Of course, it’ll always still be a bit scary, since our mind just is that way.

But when you put yourself out there, you always learn some great lesson on the way.

Like I always thought, dancing in front of hundreds of people would be scary and tense.

But when I did it myself, it ended up being easy and extremely satisfying, since I’d practiced that routine for 2 weeks straight.

That taught me that

A: Most people won’t judge you or make fun of you when you put yourself out there like that. And on talent shows, the entertainment matters the most.

B: Doing something in front of so many people just feels effortless when you know how to.

Whatever fear you have, one great experience might just completely remove it (or to a big extent).

I highly recommend participating in at least a few big events a year.

And for that, it’s extremely important to have a Vision.

Visualize how holding a great speech, winning an election, etc. would feel and look.

If you have that great goal, it’s always powerful enough to make you keep going and just do it.

3. Do self-improvement work

This is what’ll actually fix the root problem the best.

Because if you’ve ever noticed, then you know many (if not most) people around you don’t have these fears.

You do, because of some kind of traumatic experience(s).

Whether your parents taught you to “always be careful”, or something bad actually did happen once, it rewires your brain.

That’s because especially as a child, your mind just reacts to trauma that way.

And these experiences that make you paranoid now are most likely really dumb and minor situations.

Like a friend once stole your lunch and now you don’t trust anyone with your belongings.

It can also be deeper like growing up in an unstable country or region.

Now, you have to find out how you personally want to deal with it.

Maybe you want to do some daily exercise, like affirming or visualizing that nothing will happen.

Or maybe you do just want to face your fears head-on constantly and see for yourself if what you fear actually happens.

Or maybe you just want to get therapy if it runs especially deep.

Whatever your situation is, find out for yourself how to help yourself with it.

4. Not having your life in your hands

This basically means you have at least a few fields where you struggle hard.

• constantly having a messy desk or room

• coming too late to work/school often

• struggling to hit deadlines

And many other problems arise from it.

It also just feels bad. When you have all these problems, they distract you from your work a lot.

And there’s a rule to everything in life:

The way you do one thing is the way you tend to do everything (at least in some aspect).

If you have an unorganized and chaotic room, you’re gonna be unorganized during your work and during creating.

If you struggle to hit deadlines at work, you’ll struggle to hit deadlines with content.

To really get the best out of daily life and have it run smoothlessly, you need to work on fixing these.

And that can be done!

To clean up these problems, there are really only a few simple steps needed.

1. Dedicate yourself to actually fixing them

That means,

• A: Take some time daily to clean your room, set extra time to prepare for work/school, etc. You won’t have to stress yourself if you have enough time.

Make sure to do this point consistently though. If you go way too early or try to clean everything in one day, it’ll make you fall back again.

• B: Realize, you actually want to fix these problems. When you know how freeing it feels to have a clean room and be on time, you’ll do it automatically after a while.

• C: You have to pick it over whatever else you’re doing. It’s great when you’re 100% dedicated to something; on those days, it’s alright to skip something.

  But if you just have an average day, you gotta stop doing whatever else and just do that.

All of these should keep you on track.

Dedication is the first step.

2. Changing your role

And don’t underestimate how hard this point is.

You can’t magically change your self-image from one day to the next.

Especially, when your parents and surrounding people have constantly assigned you one.

You really have to do the work on this one.

Take some time daily to repeat whatever role you want to achieve.

Say, you wanna become unaddicted from junk food. Repeat “I am a healthy person that eats healthy food” (or something similar).

Do this with every field where you wish to improve - and do it seriously.

Put meaning to the words you’re saying. If you just repeat words as quickly as you can, it won’t really be that ingrained.

It’ll be a lot more effective when you focus on what you want to ingrain in your brain.

If you turn this into a consistent habit (and take it seriously), it’ll start making a huge difference.

Changing your Self-Image will have the biggest impact with this issue.

5. No Persistence or Willingness to beat Inner Resistance

Here’s a harsh truth:

You are afraid of reaching your highest potential.

Whether you know it or not, you’re holding yourself back from being at your best.

It happens in many ways:

• You get caught up in trends and just become like all other people

• You create what people like, not what you care about

• You choose quick happiness over fulfillment

And a lot more.

But, I want you to actually notice this in your life.

How are you living your life right now?

Are you genuinely creating at your best daily?

Are you constantly working on the best work you can?

And don’t judge yourself if the answer is No.

It’s hard to be at your best. It’s way harder to create something that’s genuinely your best work.

• It takes ages

• It brings a lot of Inner Resistance

Imagine it like a path you have to build through a dense forest.

You’re building your own thing here and it’s a struggle.

But - it’s extremely worth it.

I’m currently working on a project I started in March, that I’ll probably only finish next month.

I’ve had to face as much Inner Resistance as never before - but I see, it’s my best work yet.

That’s why I’ve worked on it for hours daily.

Creating at your best brings all kinds of feelings with it.

You might be incredibly fulfilled one hour and frustrated to the point of tears the next.

First, you need to know what your highest potential is.

For the longest time I didn’t - but I’ve found a definition (at least for myself):

Your best work is something that highly motivates you. It’s constantly at the back of your head and you just really want to create it. It takes a lot longer than normal work - even just finding out how you can achieve what you want.

From my now 50-video long shortfilm list, my favorite is one where I set myself on achieving a certain look.

The first time I thought of this video, I tried to make it and got frustrated. I couldn’t find how to achieve the visual I wanted.

I left the draft sit and procrastinated for 2 weeks. Then I suddenly got an idea how to make it - and spent the entire day working on it.

I finished it - and I’ve pretty much rewatched it 20 times now.

It took me a long while to even figure out how to make that effect.

And the thing is - this still isn’t my highest potential!

To really achieve your ultimate highest potential, you need to

• spend ages just to get the idea for the video

• listen to your Intuition at every step

• dedicate weeks-months to it

• push yourself every day

This might seem hard and it is - but when you finally have that end product, you feel fulfilled like nothing else.

Finishing my best work has been the best feeling in my entire life.

To work on it consistently, you’re gonna need to face a few things:

1. You’re not gonna feel good most of the time

As great as pursuing your passion is - most of the work is gonna be hard.

Making a video sounds great, until you sit on your phone for hours for 10 seconds of it.

That’s why it’s important, like mentioned before, to detach from feeling good.

Find a way to be satisfied with working on its own, without being proud all the time.

If you can find a way to just enjoy the “boring” aspects of it, you’ll be able to achieve a lot.

But - be careful here!

The “boring” work is still there to ultimately create something good. You need to visualize/imagine how you want certain scenes/parts to look.

If you’re not satisfied, try a different approach!

Sometimes, I deleted 20 mins of work to completely redo a shot I wanted to look better - and it was worth it!

Oftentimes, that look/sound is just one effect away. Always remind yourself, that it has to be possible.

If you allow yourself to feel bored or unhappy during this process then you’re gonna be able to progress way quicker.

And keep in mind:

While you create, you will get the urge to just rush a part or change it up. But in the big picture, you shouldn’t.

Because when you rewatch your old project, you’re gonna think “I could have dedicated even more time to that”.

Always take that perspective of you watching it back after you’re finished.

2. Show up daily, no matter what

And this is a serious point. SHOW UP!

You’re just gonna lose your momentum if you take a few days off to work on something else.

Dedicate yourself to at least an hour (more is even better!) to work on that project.

I know I personally took a few weeks off sometimes, thinking I had no ideas.

But when you sit down and try to figure out how to achieve what you want, that’ll ultimately also help you progress.

Know this:

Progress doesn’t automatically mean more seconds in a video/more pages in a book.

Sometimes, progress is invisible.

On one day, you might only finish half a page/second, but you’ll have a realization that changes everything.

That’s called Inner Growth - and it will happen when you make projects.

Because your best potential is something you’ve never seen before and have to grow into!

When you create a project that’s months long, at the end you always have some new tricks and lessons up your sleeve.

So, show up daily! It makes that much of a difference.

So, to close it off, you now have some principles to follow in your work:

• Detach from feeling good all the time

• Pursue your highest values

• Face fears head on

• Work on yourself

• Change your role

• Choose to create at your highest potential

If you embody at least half of these, it’ll already feel amazing.

It’s always important to continually push yourself with self-improvement.

It’s not easy, but it’s extremely worth it.

Like I’ve said:

Imagine yourself looking back months, years, decades ahead of now.

That’ll always put things into perspective.

For now, I hope this long post has helped you learn some valuable insights ;)

I wish you an amazing week and see you next Saturday!