Every man has to figure out what to do for work, but more than just a job, a man’s work is how he communicates himself to the world and makes a positive impact. So what happens when you find yourself in a position that doesn’t do that for you?

Video and podcast creator, Stephen Robles, was in such a position years ago. Now, his YouTube channel continues to grow - surpassing 100,000 subscribers in late 2024 - and he continues to try new things, like his new tech podcast, Primary Technology.

In Stephen’s words, whatever it is that you want to try or need to do, you have to start now, cause you will regret not starting later.

In this episode, Stephen shares how he changed directions in his life and work, how he made the decision and the challenges that came along with that, and how others can figure out if they may need to make a similar shift.

Find Stephen Robles Here:

Podcast: PrimaryTech.fm

YouTube: @beardfm

Find The Akkeri Here:

Website: TheAkkeri.com

Facebook: Facebook.com/theakkeri

Instagram: Instagram.com/the.akkeri

YouTube: YouTube.com/theakkeri

You know you can only fail if you quit. As long as you don't quit, there is no failure.

You might have periods of time where not much happens, but really the only way to truly fail is to quit. If you want to start something new, do start now because you will regret not starting later. I wish I had tried to change careers earlier.

Regret sucks, but also doesn't do anything for me. Now we have to hear kind of the hard truth. You're not good at this right now, but you can improve on it.

Don't make the jump while you're working to improve on it. Improve on it and then make the jump.

You are listening to The Akkeri Podcast, a show about men and masculinities, the challenges that modern men face, and how to chart a better way forward. I'm your host Matt Howlett, mental health coach and founder of The Akkeri. This episode is a conversation with video and podcast creator Steven Robles.

Stephen has been a content creator for over 15 years and recently crossed 100,000 subscribers on his YouTube channel. But he wasn't always a content creator and it's that career change that is the focus of our conversation.

We talk about starting something new and the importance of starting now. We talk about balancing work, family and self care.

And we talk about the differences between doing work that is aligned with who we are and work that is not, and how to know when you might need to make a change. Steven shares openly about his experience in a company that didn't have a healthy growth mindset and how he made the shift.

And I'm hoping his story in our conversation is inspiring and helpful to you. Well Stephen, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate you being so quick to jump on with me.

It's a pleasure to be here Matt. Thanks for having me.

Yeah, I watched your. Well, I guess it was one of your most recent videos about just basically celebrating hitting a hundred thousand subscribers on the channel, man.

Well, so first of all, congrats.

Thank you.

That was great.

And like I mentioned to you in the email when I reached out to you, I have been subscribed for a little while, I don't really know how long and I'm not on YouTube a whole lot. But I've seen a few of the videos and one of the main reasons why I reached out to you, well, because of what I saw in the video.

But honestly man, I appreciate what I see from you in the videos I see at least I feel like this sense of just genuineness, authenticity. You're just like A regular guy doing his thing, putting out content that you're interested, interested in.

And obviously over a hundred thousand people are interested in it too. So that's. That's great, man.

I'm glad that comes through. That means a lot.

Yeah, yeah, it really does. But, yeah, I would love for you to give all of us just a maybe Cole's notes version of how you came to be where you're at right now.

It doesn't have to be deep dive, but like, obviously at some point in your life, there was a change where you became content creator. Steven became the bearded teacher. Stephen.

You know, it was funny. Well, so I grew up in New York. I did music throughout high school, like musical theater and everything.

So I knew I wanted to study music, and that's what I did in college.

I came down to Florida for college, studied trumpet performance, which I always joke when I talk at like podcast conferences, has absolutely nothing to do with what I do now.

Yeah.

But I did a little bit of music for a while. I got into the travel industry and that's where I really started stretching my legs.

I was doing marketing, and so I would travel, do photography and video, and be making marketing materials for the travel company. So as I was kind of growing my skills in that, I've always loved podcasting as a medium.

But also around that same time, I was looking to change careers and I really wanted to get into full time content creation.

And so I was starting to make a few videos on my YouTube channel, but not a lot, but I was looking for jobs related to podcasting and video and working remotely. And so I found Riverside looking for video creators, and it was kind of in the podcast space.

And thankfully they took a chance on me because I didn't have a huge repertoire to show off.

But it's really worked out wonderfully and I love working for them and making videos for them and at the same time starting to make more videos for my personal channel because I just love tech and I Love teaching about it.

Sure.

And apparently it's resonated with a lot of people and really been doing that hardcore for about two and a half years and that's been successful and so I'm very thankful.

Yeah. Yeah, man. Well, I'm curious as to what inspired that, that changeover, because I've had a couple of those.

I don't know how much you know about my story with the links that I sent over, but I studied music as well, but more from a church ministry standpoint. So I studied theology with a music ministry major and eventually got into more of the marketing communications side.

Did a master's in communications through a university in Western Canada and eventually started working with a advertising agency. I was living in Alberta at the time and just met someone through a co working space.

Have been doing that as my nine to five for a while, but just started the coaching practice earlier this year. That's when the podcast started as well. So I'm very much familiar with the job change. But what was it that inspired that for you?

For me, it was several different things. But I'm interested to hear your story.

I've always been passionate about teaching. I've taught in different venues over the years, and it's one of the things that it just kind of gives me life.

I love being able to help someone understand something, help someone gain a new skill. And seeing how kind of the culture had been shifting as far as like YouTube podcasting, I felt like there was a space there.

While there's lots of other people doing similar what I do, teaching technology, showing people how to use things, I wanted to take what I thought I was good at and what I enjoyed doing, which was fundamentally teaching people how to do things. And technology has always just been a passion. Like I was always a nerd. I had little robots when I was a kid.

You know, it was just something that I could talk about for hours.

And when I realized I could kind of marry that passion with what I really enjoy doing and what I think I'm good at, which is teaching, I just really wanted to give it a go. I wanted to see, is this something that would catch on? Will people resonate with how I present these things in a more educational type way?

And it was. I just really love it.

You know, I get lots of messages on YouTube and then people email me saying they just got an iPhone, you know, and they watched my video and it helped them make the transition or they've understood something or I've made a shortcut and it's made someone's life way easier because it saves them lots of time.

And that's just one of the greatest joys, is knowing that something I did in a video, maybe making a shortcut for a few minutes, actually impact somebody's life. And it can seem like that is frivolous because it's technology or it's a phone, but it makes a difference in people's lives.

And, you know, we all have to deal with technology. It's one of the few categories that I think it's going to be around forever for as long as we're going to be alive for.

And so people are always going to have to understand how to use it and always going to want to be able to use it better. And it just feels like a natural niche for what my passions were.

Yeah, well, that's very cool. I mean, that you were able to figure that out, know what it was that you were passionate about.

Because, as you know, like, this podcast is mainly about men and masculinities. And I think one of the things that stood out to me with your story was that it's, I think, very common for a lot of men to have that.

Not necessarily a midlife crisis, but a change, you know, circumstances. You know, for myself, I'll speak for my own experience. You know, I went through separation and divorce, and I started to question my.

My faith and whether or not I wanted to be part of organized religion. Right. So part of that was the, you know, the catalyst for making that career decision. But how did you. How did you process that personally?

Like, that was definitely a bit of a shift. Like, you had the Riverside 9 to 5 job, so that kind of brought you into that world. But then putting yourself out on the.

On the Internet, on your own, even outside of Riverside, was there anything about that that was personally challenging or difficult or.

You know, obviously YouTube had been a thing for years already in podcasts, but I knew during that moment, more people were going to be looking for online content just because people were at home, didn't know what to do, whatever. So I actually started a TikTok account right there during the pandemic. And, like, the first TikTok I ever made got like 700,000 views.

I got like 10,000 followers overnight. And it just hit me like, okay, I want to capitalize on this.

And I wanted a YouTube channel because I knew for longevity, for monetization, the YouTube channel was really going to be the key to making this sustainable. And what was difficult was I was working at a job during that time where.

Where I couldn't really put myself out there and really promote it on my personal social media because my employer would not have looked favorably on that.

Which is why I originally named the channel the Bearded Teacher, because so it didn't have to be my name, so it would be semi anonymous, which made it a little harder in the beginning because I wasn't sharing it publicly on any of my platforms. And I did have some followers from the Apple Insider podcast and stuff, but I just couldn't share that and so forth.

I knew I wanted to make content online, but I was kind of hamstrung by the job I was in, which is what really motivated me to find a different career at that point and which is what brought me to Riverside. But I think, you know, I've heard this thing about writers. I think it's true of content creators.

Like, you know, you're a writer, you know, you're a creator, if you just can't not create. You know, if you are truly a writer, if you're not writing, you just have this itch. You just need to get it out of your system. You need to do it.

And that was something that I was feeling for making online video content. And it was so clear that, yes, that was the thing. And. Because when I started doing it, it just made all the difference.

Yeah, I'm curious about the.

The process of putting yourself out there and making the content, because like I mentioned, I see or sense a real genuineness in the content that you do put out. It doesn't seem to be overly produced in the sense that you are who you are. You know what I mean?

I have seen a lot of videos where I feel like the person I'm watching to an extent is almost like portraying a character, if that makes any sense. And I would assume I'm not familiar with YouTube.

I've never really put content on YouTube, but I would assume that in that world, you see a lot of these different videos, you see a lot of these different characters, you see ways of doing things that you might like, ways of doing things that you don't like. Is there any sense of pressure to be a certain way to talk, a certain way to put out certain types of content? Or what do you think about that?

Well, I know, I think today especially, authenticity is really the key. And so people who might be putting on a character or not, it's hard to say. That may just be their personality, which is great.

I knew for myself, if I tried to be anything but what I am, it would not come across well. Also for my age, like, I'm nearing 40 years old, and to try and be inauthentic at this age, I think would be even more obvious.

And so I just realized I'm going to do me.

And one of the things I could have done to probably grow faster is if you really drill down into a niche that is just extremely consistent and predictable. And so I see some channels, like, even in the tech space.

Well, it's just like video after video, it's talking about, I switched to the Galaxy S24 from the iPhone. I switched to the Google Pixel, whatever from the iPhone. And no shade on that.

Like, they have grown an audience who loves that, that content, which is awesome. And you could see that you can grow faster if every video you make is just like the one before it, but a little different and maybe a little better.

Okay.

And I knew for me to be authentic, I wanted to do multiple things. I love smart home stuff, and so I make smart home videos. I love automations, and so I do shortcuts and automation videos.

I want to be able to talk about podcast apps, and so I have videos on that.

And when you have kind of that breadth of niches can actually be harder to grow because then your audience doesn't exactly know what to expect with your next video.

Like, if I just released two smart home videos and my next video is going to be about a podcast app, that kind of throws the audience off a little bit. But I intentionally did that because I wanted it to be authentic because those are all things that I enjoy. I enjoy a smart home.

I want to be able to talk about it. And that video still do okay in views. I want to talk about this.

And so I think maybe part of why it feels authentic is because I'm talking about what I really want to talk about. I talk about what I enjoy.

And there is a balance with YouTube because if you only talk about what you want and that actually has no audience, then you're not going to grow like you. Then you don't have a viable YouTube channel.

And so there is finding that balance of what you are passionate and want to talk about and how that will provide value to the people watching on the other side. And if you can ride that line down the middle then, I think, is how you can find success.

Right? Yeah. Talk to me more about riding that line, because the video is called it's never too late for anybody that's checking out your channel.

I do have that title, right?

Yeah.

Yeah. Okay.

And you talk about how it was hard to stay motivated and how hard to keep going. What was that like? How did you keep going? How did you stay motivated?

Because for one, like you just said, it's challenging when you're putting out a bunch of different videos, and that makes it harder to grow.

You know, I've heard this quote. I don't know who to attribute it to. But, you know, you can only fail if you quit. As long as you don't quit, there is no failure.

And you might have videos that fail. You might have periods of time where not much happens, but really, the only way to truly fail is to quit.

And so during those times, I was still in a position where I couldn't make a bunch of videos and publish it, you know, publicly on my social media. But as you know, I would just give it my all. I would say, I think this video will hit. I'm gonna try and get on this trend. We'll do it.

And maybe that video flopped. And honestly, even today, this applies even to now. I.

Even if a video flops, I just immediately start planning the next one, because even if one flops, I can learn something from it. I see. That doesn't resonate, or maybe I need to have a different angle. And so I just immediately start thinking about the next one to produce, which.

It can feel a bit like that hamster wheel.

But if you're talking about something you're passionate about and that you love, which is why I've tried to have so many topics as a part of my channel, then it doesn't have to feel that hamster wheelie. It can feel more like, all right, well, what do I want to talk about next? And I remember the very first videos I made, which was during the pandemic.

If you go on my channel and sort oldest to newest, I have three videos where I talk about screen time, parental controls, And I knew that was gonna be a valuable topic because everybody would ask me personally about it. And I was like, well, let me make videos really drilling down.

And those first couple years, like, literally the first couple years, the videos were on my channel. Hundred, couple hundred views, maybe. Maybe up to a thousand.

But what's funny is today, if you look at those videos, 40,000 views, 50,000 views or more, and once you have just one of those moments where you realize the effort you put in months or years ago can still pay off today, that's immediately motivating to say, okay, well, a failure today, it might not be a failure a year from now or a couple months or even weeks from now. So let me not worry about how this is performing today.

Let me just go to the next thing, make something as well as I can, put myself into it, and then see what happens.

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense with me. I think what I'm hearing from a lot of guys that I talk to is that there's a. A grouping of failures.

It's not just like, you know, you mentioned one video flops and you learn from and you make another one. But it's like several things in life, because obviously I'm coming from a coaching perspective where generally for. For men.

Because turning to someone else for support is not the easiest thing to do. Generally, there's several things that are going on that are out of whack, hitting the fan, so to speak. Right.

So there's several, you know, quote unquote failures. And it's. It's difficult to know, I think, in that exactly what it is that you are passionate about.

So was there ever a moment where you really questioned what you were doing and whether or not this was something that you wanted to continue to pursue? Like when the videos were flopping, when the growth was slow? Was it. Was it family that, you know, stood in there and supported you?

Was it just your, you know, your gut feeling, you just want to do this, I'm just gonna keep going.

One is, you know, 100,000 subscribers. Part of me was like, I just need to know if I can do that. And I just, like, it's just something I needed to know. Could I accomplish this?

And sometimes you need to put a time limit on yourself, you know, depending on what it is in life. Like, I'm gonna give myself five years to do this, or I'm gonna give myself 10 years to do this, or I'M gonna give myself six months.

And if I don't see any growth, I do a podcast on movies with my friend Nate. And we just started it for the heck of it. It's going on its seventh a year now. Oh, cool. That's the name of it.

Shout it out.

Movies on the side. Is the show Movies on the side.

Cool.

Yeah, it's just a fun little podcast. It's really more of an excuse for us to talk to each other.

But after the first we were like episode 30 something and we told each other, you know, how long do we want to do this? Because I had a family, he was moving.

And so we set a goal and we said, okay, by episode 50, if we don't have any paid supporters, then let's call it. And we'll say, hey, we did 50 episodes. That was an accomplishment. We'll keep it around for people to listen to, but we won't do any more.

And ironically, over the next few months, by the time we got to our 50th episode, we had several people that paying us money through Patreon for bonus content. And so sometimes you need to set those kind of timelines for yourself to see if something is valuable.

Other times, you know, maybe it's five or 10 years. You just need to know personally. And thirdly, I'll say if.

When you're doing something for the benefit of others, sometimes it's just that one email or that one comment. And every once in a while, even during the slow periods, I would hear from someone and they would say, thank you so much for this video.

It helped me set up my kids devices and I feel more empowered now to do it. Or it was, you know, I liked seeing your smart home video. It helped me decide on a light switch and I love it.

And even those little moments, you know, it's so easy to see all the negative comments and hate or whatever, and failure is tough. But sometimes just one positive comment can carry you those next couple months. And sometimes it was just that.

Yeah, yeah, you bring up something that I definitely wanted to ask you about at some point, dealing with the negativity. Because anything that goes online, you know, you immediately get both sides, right.

I think the negativity sometimes outweighs the positivity and just it seems to be surfaced a fair bit more for some reason. It's more, it's more interesting to people. Drama always tends to get more, more viewers. Right. But how has that been?

How has that process been of not just really dealing with it, managing it, but taking that with you? Like, how does that affect you personally? And of course, how do you manage that online?

Every content creator has to deal with it in some way and you have to learn how to either insulate yourself from it or be able to see it. And Let it pass. And I'll give two examples. One, I wrote the original Apple Watch review for the Apple Insider website.

It was the very first Apple Watch. It was a new product category. They were taking a chance on me having me write my first big written review. And I was very excited to do it.

I spent a week with the device. I tried to be very thoughtful in my approach. I remember I gave it three stars and I said, you know, it's pretty slow, it's unfinished.

A lot of third party apps aren't great, but I think there's a future here. Notifications, fitness, all this kind of stuff. And I remember the comments on that review, you got the whole range.

People were saying three stars, it should be one star, you're an idiot. This thing is garbage. And then I would also get people saying like, this should be five stars, you're an idiot. This is the future.

And like it's life changing. And that moment helped me realize like, okay, no matter actually what you say, there will always be people who disagree in either direction.

And so there is no pleasing everybody. And so that helped me, you know, like mitigate those feelings. And then recently it was funny, I do a video tech podcast, primary technology.

We just launched it earlier in January of this year and we have, we were a five star review podcast. We have like over 200 five star reviews in Apple Podcast. Show's doing great and so many people are positive about it.

Like really 90 something percent of the feedback is positive. And I remember we had to talk about Elon Musk because of one of the news stories about SpaceX and Twitter slash X.

And you know, I really felt like the conversation we had during the episode was really nuanced. We weren't really talking about Elon Musk as a person or making judgment calls.

We were just trying to talk about the influence about these platforms and how to think about it. And a lot of people reached out and said it was very nuanced conversation.

The title of the episode was, it was something like whatever, Apple Intelligence, iOS 18, the Elon problem and something else like just kind of a throwaway line. And that next week we got a one star review in Apple podcasts.

And they said I was going to listen, but I saw the title was the Elon Problem and I immediately didn't want to hear it. So one star, you know.

Well, you know, one side, I'm like, okay, maybe I should have titled it differently because that maybe wasn't representative of the actual conversation.

Maybe I should have said the nuance problem because that's actually what we were talking about in the episode was the problem with nuance on social media. Okay, so maybe I'll think about that for the future. But also, he didn't even listen to the episode.

And what you'll usually find is that your worst critics aren't really consumers of what you're making or followers of what you make. They're usually just cursory observers that just don't like one or two things.

They see you you've done and they just write you off and you see a one star review. But you just have to keep it all in context and realize like he didn't even hear our voices talk about it.

So I'm not going to take that one star review to heart. It stinks.

But I also have over 200 five star reviews over here and I just will not let the one star taint my picture of how the audience feels about the show.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's a great way to look at it, man. It's a very positive and healthy mindset to have all that hard evidence for one to remind yourself of.

But also know that some people are going to make quick, quick judgments. Some people are just going to, you know, base their opinion off of something that doesn't even really matter all that much.

I'm curious just about the world of YouTube. I'm fairly green.

I mean, I know how to use the tool, but I've never been on your side and I would assume a lot of listeners aren't going to know much about it. What does 100,000 subscribers mean? Like, I'm not looking for specific numbers, but like, at what point can you say that?

Like, wow, like this is kind of wild to be getting a check from YouTube for X amount. And like what does it, what does that even look like?

You know, it's funny, subscriber count used to mean more to your views and income.

It actually means less nowadays because YouTube is very tunes its algorithm to just serve the best content to the people who want to watch that content. So you could have a million subscribers.

But if you make something that people don't resonate with or don't watch for very long, YouTube's not going to show that to people whether they're your subscriber or not. So it's actually an interesting change.

If you were on YouTube 10 years ago as opposed to today, which is good, good and bad, like one as a hundred thousand subscriber channel, I can't just depend on that number to get my videos views. I still have to make content that people want to watch.

But on the flip side, if you're just starting a YouTube channel today, I still think you have a huge opportunity. That's why I titled that video. It's never too late. Not just from the personal standpoint, but actually now is a good time.

I mean, if you look on your YouTube homepage or your YouTube app on your devices, you'll see channels with maybe under 100 subscribers, maybe just a couple dozen views on a video that you've never seen or subscribed to before, along with channels with millions of subscribers and views.

Right.

And that's because YouTube is trying to see, is this content that someone made, even if they're totally new to the platform, is it something that people will want to watch? And do they enjoy it? Do they resonate with it? Do they come back for more?

And so a hundred thousand subscribers today means you've made enough content that people want to watch and people will subscribe to it. But it also means you have to keep trying. And like, you can never.

Like you can't phone it in basically, even with a thousand or a hundred thousand subscribers, or a million. And you'll see it sometimes.

Like I see million subscriber channels and I'll look at their videos, like in the last 12, 10 videos, and I'm like, okay, that one didn't perform well. Why is that? Is it along the lines of their other videos? Let me watch it. Was there something about the video that didn't feel right?

And so I tell anyone trying to get into YouTube, and I think it's true for podcasting to just make content that people will want to watch or listen to. And I know it sounds over simplistic, but think about your own habits. When you go on YouTube, what do you click on? Why do you click on it?

It's because it's something that you want to watch. Maybe it's because you find it valuable, you find it entertaining, educational or inspirational, one of those things.

But it has to provide some value. And if you want to watch it, just reverse that perspective and say, what can I create that someone else will want to watch?

They want to come back, they want to see it, they'll want to see more of the same kind of content. That's the question you just always have to ask yourself when you start making this kind of content.

Yeah, I think that is more of a weightier statement than we might realize because it resonates with me.

I'll tell you why did the thesis route when I did my master's And I remember sitting down, we all had the opportunity to sit down with a couple of different profs that were kind of helping us to pick our topic and just take the. Take the direction that we wanted to take. And I was sitting down with this guy, Chase. What's his name? Thanks, Chase.

And I'm just like, man, like, I just want to do something that matters.

Like, I had all these different ideas about what I wanted to pursue and what I wanted to research and what I wanted to write about and learn more about ultimately. And he's just like, well, chances are if it matters to you, it's going to matter to someone else.

And I was like, is it the kind of thing that I knew, but I didn't really know it until he said it that way, if that makes sense.

Absolutely. And I think matters to someone else is the important part of that statement.

You know, the fact that it matters to you will give you the motivation to keep making that content, even when it doesn't perform well. But it matters to someone else is what the perspective you need when you're creating this kind of content.

If you look at my channel right now, that video, the it's never too late where I'm holding my plaque, it's probably the worst performing video I've had in, like, months. Like, it does not have the same views as the other. And everyone who's watched the video has extremely nice things to say and are very complimentary.

And they say it's really important and valuable.

Yeah.

So it's not the fact that I didn't make a good video, but it is this slight turn of when you make content, is it about you or is it about the viewer? And that video in particular was about me. Like, I was just literally talking about my journey.

Sure.

And so when you make content, think about who is is it. Will the person on the other side feel like it is for them.

And when I make a video talking about Apple intelligence, the new features on the iPhone, I'm making it for them. I want them to feel like I've made something so I can share this information.

I can share tips or insight for them to take, and it will be valuable for them. And I think that's the switch.

And people that get into podcasting, a lot of times I have to tell them, like, listen, all the small talk at the beginning of the show, all, like, doing your first episode, that's talking all about your story and all of that, it's fine. It's not going to do well because the person that's listening is not going to feel like it is for them.

You're going to feel like that episode was for you. That's not to say you can't share your story later down the line or incorporate that in your content.

And it can be important later, but you always want to be thinking, is it for them or is it for me?

Yeah. Okay.

Okay. I'm sorry to hear that, man. At no point is grief easy. It changes. I've lost both my parents. But I would love to hear a little bit about that.

What was that like for you as a content creator? Is that the only video that you've mentioned that? Do you. Have you talked about that in any other content?

I might have mentioned it before on my podcast and maybe in passing. That was the first time I really spoke about it more kind of in detail. And like you're saying, grief is, you know, it's.

It's always there in varying levels. And that's why I say that video was for me mostly because I wanted to thank certain people.

Yeah.

But I did. I wanted to share about that part of my journey.

And I also feel like I see other YouTubers, even in the tech space, who have lost a parent in the last few years, and I thought maybe it would be valuable for them kind of individually or people that are also experiencing that. So I did feel like it was finally time to let me lean into this, let me say these things.

And I probably am not going to talk about it like that again just because I don't think it will be pertinent again. But that's why I say that video was for me. It was something that I had wanted to say.

Sure. Tell me a little bit about your relationship with your. With your parents through this content creation journey.

My parents have always been super supportive, you know, no matter what I did.

And when I first started making things, you know, they watch everything, you know, my mom will tell me, like, I don't understand everything, but I watch everything, you know.

Sure.

And so it was, you know, it's always helpful and meaningful to have people who are supporting you. And my wife and kids, they were supportive. I had this little Digital sign in our living room.

And it had my subscriber count and it would constantly updating and so they could see 10,000, 15,000 all the way up. And it was kind of like they supported me too.

Like my kids would say, like, he just got another thousand subscribers or just went up another million views. And so, you know, it is. Having that support system is really important.

And for people who don't have immediate family or close friends, you know, can be harder, but. But, you know, reach out to other creators in your space and you'll find a lot of times people are very supportive, you know, creators.

There's not a ton of gatekeeping. I think a lot of creators are mutually supportive. And honestly, there's room for so many.

Like, the tech YouTube space of any space is super saturated. I mean, there's so many people, but there's still space and there's still people that are supporting each other and most. Most support each other. So.

Yeah. I'm curious, what would you would say to the man who is in your space?

Well, where you were a couple years ago, they find themselves there now where they're, you know, a couple things have not gone according to plan and they're considering a change and maybe they do feel a passion like you did that's, you know, a little bit more maybe clarified through all the challenge. What would you say as, you know, as encouragement, as direction, what's the biggest thing that you've learned that you would pass along?

You know, I have three kids. My oldest is 15.

And one of the things, especially if you're like the breadwinner of the family, it's very tough to try and branch out and do something different when your livelihood is largely dependent on maybe you not. And so I'm really big on redundancy from. In everything.

I used to work at a place where we had like three different Internet services because live streaming was a big deal, and if one went down, I wanted two backups. You know, so a big redundancy guy. And so in every stage of my career, moving to different jobs, I always kind of overlapped.

You know, I always did multiple things to see which would work and which wouldn't, and also to see what I would be good at.

You know, a lot of times we have to hear kind of hard truth to be like, you're not good at this right now, and maybe you have enough skills to realize that, but you can improve on it. It don't make the jump while you're working to improve on it, improve on it, and then make the jump. And that's what I've tried to do.

And that's tough. It means you really have to time manage. You really have to be cognizant of margin and you still have to make space for what matters.

But you can do, if you're extremely intentional and you really choose the things that matter the most, you can do it. And even me, I'm at a time now where there's very little margin, but I don't do any work on the weekends.

And so someone might say, well, that sounds like a ton of margin. It's like, well, yes, But I worked seven days a week for probably 10 plus years and that enabled me to start doing, to get into the things I am now.

And now I realize my priorities of mental health and having peace just in day to day life. I need to have those weekends wardened off from work. And so I don't work on Saturdays and Sundays, but that means my weekdays are airtight.

I went for a haircut yesterday and it threw off like all my work and I had to work a little late and squeeze things in and I feel a little bit of stress because of that. And so you do have to make those choices. But take a hard look at your schedule.

If you want to start something new, you want to try content creation, you want to try podcasting, see where you can carve out that time, be really intentional and then do it. And I say in the video, do, do start now because you will regret not starting later. And I wish I had tried to change careers earlier.

I wish I had done other things earlier. Like regret sucks.

Yeah.

But also doesn't do anything for me now. And so today I would say take a hard look, see what you really want to try.

Give yourself six months, give yourself 12 months, set out that schedule, be intentional, find out what steps you have to take to see if this is viable, if you're good at it, if you can get better at it and then start moving day by day.

I'd love to hear a little bit about your weekends. So you mentioned weekends with mental health and you've got three kids, am I right?

Yes, that's right.

Yeah. So what does the weekend look like?

Oh, I mean, I get up, do some laundry, I sit by the pool.

And I guess so there's, there's basics, but on the mental health side, what are you doing for yourself? Like, what keeps you going? What keeps you healthy? What keeps you happy?

I know if a weekend goes by and I didn't sit outside by the pool and read for maybe an hour or two.

Okay.

I don't feel great. And so I know at some point on Saturday or Sunday, I try to get out there. I try to read.

I, you know, of all the tech stuff that I do, I still love physical books. So I bring a physical book out there. I read for a couple hours. That's important to me.

My kids have been skateboarding a lot lately, and so I love sometime in the weekends being able to go to a skate park. They go skating for a couple hours. I might sit on a bench or sit in the car. I'll read. Maybe I'll do some YouTube watching just for pleasure.

And, you know, always in the back of my mind thinking, of course, like, how am I going to apply this to. To what I do next week? But. But doing those kinds of things is really important and being able to slow down.

And I worked a job for many years where I was on call basically 24 7, where I might get a text or phone call from my boss at any time. And that really took a toll on my mental health, on my stress. And so I'm so thankful to Riverside and that I can organize my life now.

Where my Focus mode on my iPhone, once it hits Friday night, no one's getting through unless they're my immediate family or the Chipotle app tells me my order is ready. Like nothing, nothing gets through. And that. That right there, I didn't realize. Sorry. I didn't realize how important that was to my mental health.

Yeah.

To be able to have a day or two where I am just free of whatever it is during the week. And I didn't realize until I was out of it.

Which is why I tell people in that video, you know, start today, because there might be things taking a toll on your mental health, even on your soul. You don't realize until you've actually made that change. And so that's why I encourage people to try and get there as fast as possible.

Yeah. Yeah. Because how long did you say it was that you were in that position? Over seven years?

I would say over 10. Over 10 years. I worked the same job, and it was very limiting in what I could do outside of it.

And it was very time constraining as far as always on call. And that was way too long.

And that's one of those things where I had three kids, you know, so you have to ride this line of I'm supporting my family and, you know, I need to be making a certain amount to do that.

And maybe it's not an option but you know, when you get desperate enough, which is where I was, you start getting real creative real fast and you start taking different multiple jobs, figuring out what you can do to. To move out of that situation. And that's what I did.

Yeah.

If it's all right with you, man, I'd love to hear a little bit about that period of time because my sense is that I know for me, I've had that similar experience where there was a period of time where I knew in some part of me that change needed to happen and I just basically ignored that. Can you just, if that's okay, tell me a little bit about that period of time?

What was going on that you could look back on now and see with probably a lot more clarity.

But what was going on then that, you know, you could speak to, that was definitely going to resonate with other guys who are maybe in that situation that you were then. Does that make sense?

Yeah. You know, I read There's a book, 4,000 Weeks, which I highly recommend, by the way.

Okay.

And in that the author. Sorry, I'll. I'll look it up.

4,000 weeks.

4,000 weeks, the name of the book, but it basically talks about the human lifespan is 4,000 weeks. And so that's all you get. And one of the things it talks about is when you become highly efficient at whatever you do, people will always.

Well, not people will always not great. People will do their best to extrapolate as much as they can from you, knowing your high efficiency and high capacity and basically suck you dry.

Sure.

And I've always been a hard worker. That's something that I got from my dad. He was a hard worker.

And I could see even now in retrospect him talking about his jobs and how it affected him. But I was very good at what I did. And as I moved up the ranks in this job, I got closer and closer to the main leader.

And there's this balance or this sliding scale of as you're moving up, you're given more responsibility, you get more brought into the important meetings, you get more access to high level leaders. Whatever job or career that is, it feels good on one side because you feel rewarded, you feel acknowledged, and.

And I'm very much like affirmation driven, like when I accomplish something or accomplishment driven, achievement driven. And so there was this thing where I was felt like I was achieving things. And so it kept me there for a long time.

But there's this turning point where I realized how toxic the environment I was actually in. And I started seeing More and more moments with clarity of just manipulation and this narcissistic leadership and gaslighting both of me.

And once you're in those high level meetings, secret meetings, you start seeing staff, you know, people lower on the totem pole being gaslit and manipulated.

Sure.

And I realized this is not getting any better and if I stay here, I will lose myself. I also feel like I'm wasting time and I do not feel right about being here.

And you know, I wish I could have seen it sooner, but it eventually got to the point where I knew like I just, I had to go, I had to get out of there. And you know, ideally you leave before you get to that like crucial point.

And even then I didn't leave until I had a job lined up and I had signed the contract because of my redundancy mindset. And it was scary leaving a job of 10 years, high paying job that was provided with good health insurance.

But when you look at what's important in life, what you want to try and achieve, especially as you grow older, like I am, like it's important, you have to make those big decisions and yeah, that's what I did.

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's, that's a challenging spot to be in because it's easy for us now, both of us.

You know, I can res, I can understand that, that experience. I've felt that both of us can look back, you know, with clarity now.

You know, obviously hindsight 20 20, but in, in that situation, I think it's, it's super key to be able to have a sense of awareness, a sense of, well, I guess we'll call it probably emotional intelligence is probably the best thing to label that as.

Because you need to know what you're feeling and be able to name that to an extent to at least understand that experience and realize that that's not good for you. Does that make sense to you?

Absolutely. By the way, 4,000 weeks. The author is Oliver Berkman.

Okay, Oliver Berkman.

But what that self awareness is so tough because oftentimes if you're working a job that you feel like you're achieving or maybe you're even affirmed by people, it's hard to connect that to maybe how it's affecting your stress level or your mental health. And so you really have to be able to step outside of it. And sometimes the only indicators or the best indicators would be the people closest to you.

Maybe it's a spouse, maybe it's kids, close friends, maybe your parents, if they are seeing and are Saying you seem really stressed, you seem kind of down, you seem distant, whatever those adjectives that you start hearing.

You know, it can be frustrating sometimes because if you feel like you're achieving things and this person over here saying you seem down, like it doesn't make sense sometimes, especially as, you know, a guy, if you're, again, very achievement driven like I was, it feels like a contradiction. Like I'm achieving these things, I'm doing these big things. What do you mean? Like, I shouldn't feel that way or be that way.

But try to be open to hearing those things because it probably means something is off, something is affecting you maybe on a deeper level, something that maybe you even want to ignore, because the achievement or the affirmation feels good enough to override that. And it's a tough spot. It's a tough spot to be, and I totally get it.

But just try, try to be aware, especially the people around you that are close to you, that, that you trust. You know, what do they think, what do they say? And try to really listen.

Yeah, I keep thinking of the phrase where there's smoke, there's fire. And I wouldn't consider it to be like one comment from one person, you know, to be reason enough to question your, you know, your setup and make.

Make a different decision. Career change, at that. But if you've got a couple people, you know, who are taking the risk of giving you that feedback, because I don't.

I don't think that the majority of people would be that forward. I mean, I don't. I don't really know. I mean, it depends on the type of relationships that you have, of course, and how close people are to you.

But if there's more than one person, you know, like you mentioned, just asking you, it seems like you're doing a little different lately. You're a little more stressed out, you're a little more irritable, whatever. Right. More headaches, whatever it is. Right.

Because the stress that we experience, the emotions that we suppress, they come out in different ways for different people. For me, there's always headaches and skin issues. That's always been the thing for me.

But I think if you got a couple people, I think that sounds like the sign irritability.

That's it for me. Sure. And especially with three kids, you know, it's going to come out there.

And it was amazing to me how different I felt and how differently I related to my kids and to my spouse once I left that job because it was such a shift.

And, you know, one Thing I was interested in when I started working for Riverside, they're, they're based in Tel Aviv, so most of the team is not American.

Okay.

And when I started working there, my free, my first couple weeks, I would make a video or I would make something and they would say like, well, you know, it's the brand. It needs to change to this to match. And I would apologize a lot. I would say, oh, sorry. Oh, sorry. And eventually someone said, stop saying that.

Like, don't say sorry. You know, you, you don't know. Like you didn't know. You didn't make some intentional mistake. Yeah. There's actually no reason to apologize.

And it was such a kind of a moment for me because I realized where I worked before, it was such just a natural state to feel like you did something wrong because of the gaslighting and manipulation that was happening that I just got so programmed to just say sorry even for things that weren't my fault. And that was another sign to me that my mind shift had just, my mindset had just been broken enough to not even realize those kinds of things.

And I was so thankful that it could be pointed out in a, in a kind way to say like, you know, you don't have to do that. Like, that's not actually how you need to function.

And I think a lot of people experience that, especially in corporate America, especially in very heavy leader oriented businesses. Like in toxic leader oriented businesses, you just get those kind of habits and mindsets and it takes a toll.

And sometimes, you know, you don't even know you're in it until someone points it out.

Yeah, yeah. It's not the easiest thing to see when you're in it. And it's hard to be, oh well, it's impossible to be objective when you're, when you're in it.

I think it's so important for us to be able to have deep relationships so we can trust those people who say those things. And one of the things that I talk about a lot with all the work that I do in the Ocari is vulnerability and the importance of vulnerability.

The importance of like, in this context, being able to ask for feedback and being able to say, hey, like, this is what I'm considering. This is what. Where my head's been at recently. You know me. What do you think? Right. That's not the easiest thing to do. And I get that. I've been there.

I do think that some people find that easier than others. But man, is that ever important. I wish I had probably the mentors the father figures. Without getting into my backstory too much.

My father passed away a couple years ago, but my parents split when I was young.

So I didn't always have that, but I didn't always have that father figure, that mentor, to question what I was doing, to push back on decisions that I was making. You know what I mean? And I find that has come up so much in just a few podcasts that I've done with every man that I've spoken to, right?

Where it's like, oh, mentoring, so important community. That concept of I'm there for you, you are there for me.

We are able to choose vulnerability, at least to the point where we can ask each other for feedback.

Well, I think that vulnerability is so hard, especially here in America, because so often, especially in the workplace, if something goes wrong or something bad happens, most often it just turns to who is to blame. Yeah, who was responsible.

And that's always like that, typically where the conversation goes, which immediately puts everyone on the defensive because no one wants to be to blame. No one wants to have been their fault. And I think, again, it's such a shift.

If that's your workplace, if that's your environment, there are workplaces, there are bosses who, when something goes wrong, they actually don't hunt for someone to blame, but instead ask, how can we fix it for the future?

Right?

And I remember when I was working in the travel industry, we made brochures for trips and things like that, and the price was wrong on a brochure, and we found that it had been delivered to, like, over a thousand people. It was several hundred dollars less than it was supposed to be. Company might lose thousands of dollars because people are going to argue.

That's what it says on the brochure.

Right?

And I remember someone, I was with the CEO boss, we were having a meeting and someone came running in mentioning this issue with the brochure pricing. And I'm sitting there from my experience thinking, oh, someone's going to get hammered for this. Someone made a huge mistake.

And when the person mentioned the problem, I remember the CEO just sitting there for a second and he just asked, well, what can we do? What can we do to fix it?

And it was such a jolt to me to realize, like, oh, like there's actually a perspective for even when something goes wrong to have that learning mentality, to have a growth mentality, to have a how can we get better mentality, as opposed to who can we find to blame so it doesn't happen again? Because honestly, that's not constructive. Even if you do have a name and you say, well, so and so got it wrong, that means nothing for next time.

Doesn't mean we never trust so and so again, doesn't mean we know, like, what does that mean then? And so they're like, if that's the environment, just know, like it's not healthy. Yeah, Blame is always the first reaction.

Oh, yeah, man. A very simple short story comes to mind. I used to be a pastor, so I did that for about seven years.

Three years volunteer, where I had a nine to five paid job outside of that world. And then four years paid and, well, I actually did another year in Alberta. But that's besides the point.

This one position that I held required me to have a meeting with a leadership team, as you would every, you know, say, six to eight weeks or whatever it was. And we had just pulled off a presentation that was different than past presentations. And I was kind of in charge of this, right.

And I remember sitting around the table and I could feel the tension that you could cut it with a knife, you know, I should say. Right. And I remember bringing up that point because we had already had a bunch of feedback and it was mainly blame game negative, not overly helpful.

And I just.

I don't remember exactly what I said, but I suggested that we should have some constructive criticism, like some feedback that's actually forward, you know what I mean? What can we do to make this better if you hate it so much? And. But that didn't help anybody, you know what I mean? In that moment, I felt small.

I felt definitely like I had been just thrown under the bus kind of thing. Even though, you know, I was the guy, I was the person in leadership at that moment. But does it help anybody?

Like, does anybody in the room improve as a human after they leave, that type of setup? You know what I mean? Does that help anybody or the situation even? Absolutely not. So why do we do it? You know what I mean?

And I think it's just years of habitual blaming. That is just how corporate structures now work here in America, for better, for worse. And to try and buck that trend, a lot of times it just doesn't.

Doesn't fly, you know, and the people usually in leadership positions are not open to that kind of change. But, yeah, it's unfortunate.

Yeah. We've made it through a full podcast episode the day after your election, and we didn't talk about the election. I'm proud of us.

Yeah. You know, I posted a video today, which was the day after the election, and and felt weird.

Cause I'm like, everyone's in a weird mood, but you know what? Life has to move on. And some people even thanked me for, like, the distraction.

So, you know, I've seen that from a couple of American content creators. I can't remember the person's name, but the Instagram handle is under the desk News. Have you heard of that?

Yeah, I actually see them on TikTok. They're very funny.

Yeah. Yeah. So they posted a video, I think it was this morning, and it was just like, recovery mode. Right.

Staying away from the Internet, head in the sand just for a few hours. Right. I mean, I. I feel for you guys, no matter what side of the, you know, politics you land, but it seems like it's been wild because I've.

I feel it. I mean, obviously I'm in Canada and we are right next to you guys. We very much are in the. In the game with you.

But I've heard it so much on the podcast that I follow over the past couple of months. Everybody's like, you know, concerned about it and they're, you know, pushing their candidate and whatever.

No. And that's one of the things, like, honestly, on my social media, I really love not talking about politics, not talking about divisive issues.

Yeah.

There's plenty of places to go if you want to hear that or engage with that. But that is one place where I'm glad to stick in my niche. Thankfully, most of the time, not all the time, but most of the time, technology is not.

Not a political issue. Sometimes it is.

Sometimes there's laws and, you know, regulations and things like that, but it's usually few and far between, and I can just focus on teaching people how to use their tech and having fun with it.

Yeah, it sounds like a lot more fun to me. Thank you for listening. I hope you found some value in this episode.

If you have, be sure to share the Ocari podcast with a friend and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can find The Akkeri on socials at The Akkeri and on the web at TheAkkeri.com