Matt Ragland admits his latest vlog isn't great but ships it anyway. His wife's support matters more than perfection, and keeping things simple beats over-editing. He's moving from Nashville to Chattanooga.
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Hi, welcome. It's late. It's late for me to just be doing this part of the vlog, and it's kind of late by parent standards. It's close to 8 PM right now, and our son just went down to sleep. Now, it's not late for like normal human beings, but if you have kids, anything after 7 starts to feel late. I didn't like— I didn't like today's vlog. I really didn't. And this is the 11th one, and I'm really proud of myself for that. I'm proud of myself for getting this vlog out today, this episode, because again, I don't feel great about it. But that's kind of the point, and it's kind of the important part about shipping one of these every single day. Gonna be ones that I think really suck. Like, I'm not pleased about today's. Let me tell you just a couple of things that I feel like I've learned already just in these 10 days. This again is day 11 of the vlog, and shipping something, even though it's only been 11 days, I can't tell you the last time I rode 11 days in a row. And I've really enjoyed putting out these videos every day. In fact, I was talking to my wife. I was talking to my wife last night and because I did the "We're Leaving Nashville" video yesterday and she said, "I really like how you did that. I think, you know, I think it's a good medium for you." And that really struck me because we don't talk a ton about my blogging or, you know, writing. We talk some about like sketchnotes and stuff like that. She thinks it's cool. But We don't talk a ton about work because it's just, yeah, we try and kind of leave, leave work off to the side as much as we can. And to get her kind of thumbs up on the vlog, even in just a small way, was, was really meaningful. I mean, anytime, anytime you're doing something creative, anytime you're doing something that takes time away from time that you could be spending with loved ones. Like right now, my, my wife's inside and yeah, I'm not spending time with her. I'm doing the vlog and then I'm gonna spend like maybe 15 minutes, 20 minutes editing the vlog. So we're talking about not a ton of time, but you know, if you have kids, you work full-time, that 30 minutes is 30 minutes, man. And to get her support on that really meant a lot to me. And I wonder if she's Okay, I thought she might be right there. That really meant a lot to me. And so really appreciative that she shared that with me. But it, again, it does stand out to me. I can't tell you the last time I wrote 10 days in a row, but to do 10 videos, to do 11 videos in a row, and to be excited about the next 10, 20 videos that are going to come out over the next 20 days, to have her like excited about it with me, that's important to me. And that triggers something for me that isn't always there. So I'm just noticing that over the past few days that I've been enjoying this, that I've been shipping these videos. A couple other things just from the past, just from the first 10 days of this. It's really hard to dial back editing. Once you get into something, you know, I want to make it look really good. You see like great vloggers and their cuts are smooth and you don't feel bored because they've got their storytelling down and they've got, you know, again, their cuts and their edits are down. So you feel like you're in different places. It's not just me sitting on my front porch and, you know, going through a little monologue with you. And so it feels very snappy and I'm not there yet. I don't, I don't have the time I don't have the talent yet, but I'm getting there. But just noticing that and already trying to feel like it's taking up more of my day than I expected and trying to scale back on that because again, I don't want to jump so deeply into this that it's hard to like extract myself from making it a consistent practice. So that's probably— that's the biggest thing that over the past 10 days I've learned and have felt like is just let's just make sure that we keep it simple. Let's make sure that this gets shipped every single day and the ideas will come, the skill will come, the editing will come. But if I just get worked up over like, oh, this one isn't perfect, or oh, I'm tired, or oh, I don't have a good topic today, that's not going to work. Or oh, the lighting on my front porch isn't very good and doing this to my eyes. That's gonna happen. So that's— those are the two biggest things that I felt like for these first 10 videos. One, it's incredible to have some buy-in from my wife and to have her enjoy them and watch them. And number two, just keeping it simple. Keep it simple, keep it simple, keep it simple. If I go to like twice a week, you can spend more time on it. But I do like, and this is what I wanted in February, to keep shipping, to keep putting it out there, to not worry about is it perfect, is it edited wonderfully, does the music flow the way that I want, is it telling a story, is it providing value. I wanna do all those things, but I don't know if it's gonna happen every single day, but that doesn't mean that I don't show up and that I don't ship, okay? Alright, I'm gonna go inside. It's been a good day. I forgot to set up the water in Chattanooga, so we're here in Nashville still for one more day. We're gonna go down tomorrow and just deal with no water for an evening. So thoughts and prayers appreciated. Get another video tomorrow. We'll be in our new place in Chattanooga, but thanks for watching. Subscribe, give a thumbs up to this if you've liked it, and yeah, I'm really enjoying this. Can't wait to send you another video tomorrow. Take care.
