What Making YouTube Videos Is Teaching Me About Myself

I have been having a lot of fun making YouTube videos lately.

That feels like a simple sentence, but it has been teaching me more about myself than I expected. On the surface, it is just a hobby: sit down, talk about technology, film some B-roll, edit the whole thing together, and send it out into the internet. But the more I do it, the more I realize that making videos puts a spotlight on parts of myself I usually get to work around.

The biggest thing I have learned is that I am much better at writing my thoughts than speaking them out loud.

When I write, I can slow down. I can move pieces around. I can sit with an idea until it starts to feel honest. Writing gives me the space to internalize something before I share it. Speaking to a camera does not give me that same comfort. Sometimes I sit down, hit record, and every thought I had five minutes ago just disappears.

It is humbling.

Writing First, Speaking Second

There is some history behind that.

Fun fact: when I was little, I had so many ear infections that I was effectively deaf for the first few years of my life. I communicated through sign language in my earliest years, and I think that shaped me more than I realized.

It set me back in a lot of ways, especially when it came to speaking my thoughts clearly in the moment. I have always been able to think deeply about things. I have always had ideas. But getting those ideas out of my head, through my mouth, and into the world without first writing them down has never felt natural.

I have improved a lot, especially through work. My day-to-day job forces me to communicate constantly: design decisions, product feedback, client conversations, technical constraints, project planning, all of it. That repetition has helped. I can explain myself much better now than I could years ago.

But YouTube is different.

At work, I am usually reacting to a real conversation. There is another person there. There is context, back-and-forth, a shared problem to solve. With YouTube, it is just me, a camera, and the very strange pressure of trying to sound like myself while staring into a lens.

That is a skill. I am not great at it yet. But I want to get better.

The Steam Deck Video

One of the videos I made in 2025 was about the Steam Deck LCD, and it kind of blew up.

At the time of writing this, it has over 16,000 views, which is wild to me. The funniest part is that I did not think of it as some big, polished production. It was a little bit of a throwaway video. The B-roll was rough. The setup was not perfect. I was mostly just talking about a piece of technology I genuinely love.

And people showed up.

Not just views, either. The comments were full of people from all over the world having awesome conversations about the Steam Deck, handheld gaming, Linux, and the weird joy of owning a device that feels open and personal in a world where so much technology feels locked down.

That was electric.

I have loved the Steam Deck for a while, and I have been getting more and more excited about Linux gaming in general. Seeing other people get amped up about the same thing made the whole video feel bigger than me. It reminded me that enthusiasm is contagious when it is real.

Finding the Signal

That video also taught me something important about audience.

I do not think I need to chase whatever is trending. I do not want to turn making videos into a content treadmill where I am constantly asking, "What will the algorithm like?" That sounds exhausting, and honestly, it sounds like a fast way to stop enjoying it.

But there does seem to be an audience for the things I am naturally excited about. Technology, gaming, design, Linux, tools, setups, and the little details that make products feel personal. Those are the things I already think about. Those are the conversations I already want to have.

YouTube is helping me see that my interests are not random. There is a thread running through them: I like technology that gives people more agency. I like tools that make people feel capable. I like systems that invite tinkering instead of punishing it.

That is probably why the Steam Deck resonates with me so much. It is not just a handheld gaming PC. It is a little computer that says, "Go ahead. Mess with it."

I love that.

Getting Comfortable Being Uncomfortable

The uncomfortable part is that making videos exposes the gap between the way I think and the way I currently speak.

In my head, everything feels connected. I can see the shape of the argument. I can feel the point I am trying to make. Then the camera turns on and suddenly I am reaching for the words like they are on a shelf just slightly too high.

That used to frustrate me more. Now I am trying to see it as the whole point.

YouTube gives me a reason to practice. It gives me a reason to get more comfortable speaking before everything is perfectly organized. It gives me a reason to share enthusiasm while it is still alive, instead of waiting until I have refined it into something safer.

I do not want to lose the part of me that writes first and thinks deeply. That is a strength. But I also do not want to be limited by needing every thought to be fully internalized before I can say it out loud.

There is a middle ground I want to grow into: thoughtful, but more fluid. Prepared, but still human. Clear, but not over-rehearsed.

Why I Want to Keep Going

Overall, making YouTube videos has been fun. It has also been a lesson in my strengths, interests, and weaknesses.

I am learning that I can write. I am learning that speaking is still harder for me. I am learning that the things I get excited about can connect with other people. That last part might be the most important.

I want to keep making videos because I like the process, but also because it is pushing me toward a version of myself I want to become. Someone who can explain ideas clearly. Someone who can share excitement without overthinking it to death. Someone who can sit in front of a camera, lose the thread for a second, find it again, and keep going.

For now, that is enough of a reason to hit record.