I Quit YouTube?! | How I Determined Whether to Stay or Quit

About two weeks ago, on September 13th or 14th, I decided to quit YouTube (as a career option, not a hobby).  I awoke from a nap and distinctly thought, “I should quit YouTube.”  It was a defined moment of clarity, as absolute as night and day.

When I officially started my channel almost four years ago in late 2014/early 2015, I was a 23-year-old stay-at-home wife and mother of three small children, including a newborn, who felt overwhelmed with life and who was struggling with trying to balance everything.  I was in desperate need of inspiration and motivation to replace the chaos that surrounded me with structure, so I started to research. I read articles and watched YouTube videos about homemakers just like me. Channels such as Do It on a Dime, How Jen Does It, Malitose79 a.k.a. Clutterbug, and The Green Apple Home inspired me to record videos of my own.

At first, I benefited from this newfound hobby.  I was able to begin to replace the chaos with structure by establishing routines, partly because people were encouraging and inspiring me by watching my videos and with their positive feedback.  As time wore on, especially within the past five months, I slowly began to realize that my YouTube “career” fails to make the best use of my monetizable skills and abilities. 

It took me months to accept this fact and gain the courage to quit.  There are a few reasons why:

1. I was committed to my YouTube channel and my community. I always felt like I owed them my best service, especially after I had monetized my channel in the fall of 2016.
2. I coveted the $61.70 that’s still in my Google AdSense account (which took me fifteen months to earn post-monetization), especially after YouTube demonetized my channel in January due to the new channel monetization regulations.  But, the minimum required for a paycheck issue is $100, so I became a slave to improving – attempting to, anyway – my channel in order to meet these new requirements for re-monetization.
3. I felt like it would be a waste of all the consideration, effort, and time that I poured into my YouTube channel, so I thought that if I tried harder and consistently did my best, I would achieve my goals for my channel.

After that post-nap realization about 14-15 days ago now, I prayed and did some soul-searching. I came to a few conclusions:

1. I don’t owe absolutely anyone anything…
2. …and absolutely no one owes me.
3. YouTube no longer fulfills its intended purpose in my life.  I’ve evolved as a homemaker and person in general, and I no longer need to record videos for motivation since habits and routines have been ingrained into my being.
4. I continued to pour a lot into YouTube but no longer felt like I was getting what I wanted from it.  After almost four years, I remain mediocre as a YouTuber, because my personal abilities and skills are not being used at peak performance on this platform.  So, I needed to cut my losses and move on.

Deciding to quit was not an easy decision, but I know that this choice will guide me in the right direction of a fulfilling, monetizable career path.