5 Reasons Why I Want To Share Online
In December 2022, a couple of days before Christmas, I checked myself into the ER because I was in so much pain that I could hardly move. The more I would move, the more pain I'd be in.
I got some bloodwork done, and while waiting for my test results, sitting there fearing the worst, I opened notes on my phone and started typing “How to Formulate Freedom”.
This was the thing I'd always wanted to do but put off; I'd always wanted to document and share my story, show and tell people how I got free.
My actual diagnosis was not at all life-threatening, and I've since made a mend, but I never stopped writing.
Now I've got a book's worth of notes written down about my life, and this incessant desire to share it.
But where would I share it? Well... online, of course!
But why? Why would I bother? Why would I go to the effort? Well, for your sake, and my own, that's what I'm trying to answer here:
1) I just feel compelled to. I feel so called to it.
My life has been positively impacted so much by other people sharing, and I have consumed so much that I feel like I'm at my limit and I need to pay it forward and do my bit, to contribute back into it.
Even though I don't feel like I could compare to the people whose content I've consumed and benefited so much from.
I still feel like it's something I want to, and have to do, For whatever it's worth, for whoever might be interested and potentially benefit from it.
2) A big thing for me was this small section of a talk on YouTube between Naval Ravikant and Kapil Gupta.
In this conversation, Naval explains to Kapil how whenever he is learning something, he instantly envisions himself teaching it or sharing it with others.
He asks Kapil, 'Why is that? Why does it not feel real unless I'm teaching it to someone else?'
Kapil replies: 'Why does that matter?'
He goes on to say that the greatest desire always wins. If the desire to turn that into a teaching and share it is there, then the quickest way through it is to actually do it.
He then says, 'suppression is regression,' which I kind of take as 'what you resist will persist.'
And hearing that helps me for two reasons:
- Kapil's logic just resonates with me.
I feel that if you want to do it, you kind of have to do it. Otherwise, at the very least, you'll be tormented by the fact that you want to do it but aren't doing it. I think this is the same for things like pursuing your passion.
- Naval is an extremely successful, happy person who could do anything he wants. He's so rich that he's set for life. He could just read books and tend to his garden, yet he's on YouTube confiding in this spiritual teacher about how he has this same yearning to transform experiences into shareable moments.
So, if I felt this desire when I was broke, and still feel it now, and Naval still feels it at his extremely accomplished and successful level, it kind of says to me it isn't going to go away. I might as well just do it.
3) Another part of this for me is my early days of rapping and sharing my music with friends, family, and followers online.
For years of my life, from about 15 to 20, I was constantly writing songs about my feelings and experiences, recording them, and releasing them online.
I look back now, and it's so clear what this was doing for me; it was allowing me to express myself.
Monthly, and sometimes even weekly, I was releasing new music, putting everything I felt and thought into these songs, and sharing them with the world.
The therapeutic nature of this cannot be understated. Looking back now, it's crazy to think how positively that impacted my life.
The level of introspection that goes into writing, the level of bravery it takes to share something,
the confidence you get from people congratulating you on your efforts,
and a huge, huge part is that connection to people, being able to just share that little bit of you out into the world.
This could be the most important part of it all. To share your art and, in some way, connect with the collective consciousness.
Making and sharing my music at a young age was the building block of my whole life now;
I can trace all of my skills and accomplishments now back to learning about creating and sharing my art, even though the act of making and sharing music now has virtually 0% to do with my career success; I still owe all of it to that.
And I think that proves how beneficial it can be to do something even if it doesn't have a clear monetization strategy or even a justifiable reason for wanting to do it.
4) I have done physical work and run physical businesses for many years, and it’s very tolling.
The amount of effort and coordination that goes into operating retail store fronts, staff, large yearly production cycles, and a million other things that come with it - it's a lot.
As I grow older and I hope wiser, I become increasingly selective about what things I allocate my energy to.
I’ve been stripping back the parts of my businesses I dislike, even leaving a lot of money and opportunity on the table, to instead optimize for things like time and freedom.
As I focus more and more on exactly how I am designing my life, I'm looking at ways I can make a living and support my family while still doing what I love.
If I wanted (or needed) to increase my income, I wouldn’t want to do it in a way that results in me needing to do more “real world” or “physical world” tasks, or labor, you could say.
I’m being mindful of not signing up for anything that will lead to more work that I don’t want to do.
I’m really starting to think about how I can leverage technology, the internet, my mind, and my personal story and experiences into something that can support my lifestyle.
On one end, I'm doing this because I feel like I'm going to explode if I don’t just start sharing my story.
On the other end, I am aware and you could say hopeful it could lead to something more. But I try to keep that far away from influencing anything I do.
There's a good Naval quote on this where he says:
'The best way is to follow your obsession. And in the back of your mind, keep an eye out for the commercial aspects of it. If you try to build it too deliberately, and become goal-oriented on the money, then you won’t pick the right thing. You won’t actually pick the thing that you love to do, so you won’t go deep enough into it.'
So that's what I'm trying to keep in mind.
5) Steve Jobs said the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who actually do.
In his case, and in the case of many other influential creators, this has proven to be drastically true.
And I think the ones who are crazy enough to think they can change their own world are the ones who actually do.
It’s easy to say, “I'm nobody,” “Who wants to hear me speak,” “What have I done,” “Who am I to try and teach people anything.”
But imagine if, when I started my own company, I said those same things: “Who am I to start a scooter company?” “Why would anybody want to buy scooter parts off me?”
Which is the way a lot of people think and what stops them from starting their own thing.
I was crazy enough to think I could start my own brand and make a living from it. And I did.
And now I'm sitting here thinking:
I’ve lived an interesting life. From leaving home at 14 and living with heroin addicts and stealing to survive, to eventually flying all over the world riding my scooter.
I’ve accomplished a lot. Like starting multiple successful businesses despite having almost zero high school education.
And I’ve figured out a lot along the way. Like how to do all that without becoming miserable, without compromising my values, while making a living from my passion and living an epic life.
So maybe, just maybe, I could be the kind of person who talks about their story, who breaks down their experiences and shares it with people in a way that helps them on their own journey.
So there you have it, that's why I want to share stuff online.