The Myth of Casey Neistat

I'm jealous of Casey Neistat. He has done things I could only dream of.

He makes money from daily vlogs he posts on YouTube. And is wildly successful.

Casey started to vlog everyday on March 2015 as a creative challenge. To wake up and put pressure on himself to create.

He stopped after 604 days straight.

I thought to myself, “This is self-sabotage! How could he give up what made him successful?”

To him, the vlogs got easier, more robotic. The success made him feel... comfortable.

To me, that was the point of a creative entrepreneur's success. Creating content so that you can make money when you sleep.

To him, there wasn’t the creative struggle he craved. In its place was a creative complacency that ate at him.

And to me, he was right.

From podcasting to essays and my newsletter postcards. I use the everyday as material for my work. I’ve always wanted to be publish everyday, but have never dared to.

What did I have to bring to the table?

Casey knew he had something to say. And he shared it with his vlogs.

But for me, what would be the significance of doing it everyday?

I take these challenges as a way to prove something to myself. I've had a habit of doing these. From a Muay Thai fight, running 10KM everyday for a month and podcasting 4 times a week.

But wanting to write and publish everyday has been the one I have been most apprehensive in starting.

There's a fear of introspection.

I would watch recordings of my training to pick at what went wrong.

I dread listening to my voice after every podcast recording.

And I've never read back a single article after publishing.

There's also a fear of not being useful.

Who will read what I post? What value will people derive from my life?

There's a constant struggle between wanting to be a prolific creator and the fear of no one caring. Or as my friend Zain Rizvi puts it, “The Creator’s Paradox”. And the only way to quell it is through action.

Publishing

If you have something to say and a way to say it, not sharing with the world is an arrogant act.

During Casey’s announcement about ending his daily vlog, people left comments about how his vlogs have helped them.

Consistent publishing gave his audience the chance to see the beauty in the everyday. A highlight reel of a life that is often obscured in the mundane of the everyday.

I see glimpses of this when I publish as well. Readers liking my personal postcards. And an ex-classmate commenting on my writing and wanting to read more.

The Absurd

Albert Camus wrote that there will always be a conflict between what we want and what is there. He calls the conflict The Absurd. Something you cannot escape from. And to face it is to struggle against it. He gives the example of The Myth of Sisyphus.

Sisyphus was punished to roll a rock up a mountain only to have it roll back down to the bottom when he reaches the top. To struggle without hope of success. And as Camus puts it, so long as he accepts that there’s nothing more to life than this absurd struggle, he’ll find happiness.

Casey Neistat was Sisyphus, dealing with The Absurd.

There was no point in resolving the struggle of creating and publishing. Because the struggle will always be. And there is value in wrangling with it. We’ll stare into the void. We’ll want to say things but we’re never sure. We’ll do the work that might not work, and often without instruction.

As creators, there will be nothing more in the creative process than this absurd struggle.