The Truth About Restarting Your YouTube Channel or Newsletter

How being "stupid" makes you more confident and consistent when posting online.

Yo, how’s it going?

I've been gone a while. Mostly afraid of coming back to crickets and judgment I guess but f*ck it. Here’s my reentry.

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Welcome to Secret Learning Notes—where I share my discoveries of deep spiritual truths in realtime.

I help multidisciplinary creatives with ADHD rewire their brains to build focus and holistic habits without “hustling harder”.

If you need predictability and perfect science, this isn’t the letter for you.

If you want raw experiences and relatable quirks, welcome home.

Now let’s dive into today’s learning notes.

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If you’ve been waiting for the “right time” to restart your YouTube channel or newsletter, here’s the truth:

It doesn’t exist.

No amount of planning and researching your “perfect niche” will help you gain the momentum you lost.

You don’t need MORE CLARITY.

You know this but you’re confused by the “should bros” and the prior commitments you made when you got excited.

Underneath all of that is fear. Fear of judgment. Fear of looking stupid in front of your coworkers, friends, or even your parents.

I get it. I’ve been there. I AM there. I haven’t posted in months. But watching growth and business videos doesn’t revive that momentum—posting does.

You have to produce, not just consume.

Especially if you’re a perfectionist. It’s easy to obsess over details. But here’s a harsh but freeing truth:

People dumber than you are making more money simply because they aren’t afraid to look dumb.

They aren’t just making more money but they’re fulfilled doing it. And that’s what matters. But you can only manifest the same results outside of your comfort zone.

Recently, I’ve heard an interesting statement.

God favors fools and babies.

Why? Because they don’t have preconceived notions of what success looks like. They do what they gotta do by instinct. And it ain’t always pretty but they get closer to the truth.

Last week, I went to the library and picked up the book, Who Moved My Cheese?

Sounds stupid but I’m like, “F*ck it, it’s popular so it must be good right?”

The big theme is that shit happens—your comfortable life situation like a job position or uninterrupted creative time gets taken away (The Cheese). But you have to move on. No amount of complaining will improve your life or get you new cheese.

There are two sets of characters:

1. Mice (stupid but take action and get results)

2. Littlepeople (us overthinkers who think we’re too smart to take action).

We, the smarties, are the real idiots because our big brains stop us from taking action. We’re too smart for our own good and it ruins our ability to go after what we want.

You’ve probably watched a lot of videos on YouTube or Substack growth.

They say you gotta have your lighting a certain way, you need perfect audio, post daily, be controversial, you have to have a special camera, and you gotta have a flashy hook.

But I’d argue that that’s stopping you from posting—the only thing that matters for improvement and impact.

Advice that makes it 10x worse

You hear advice to repurpose your content everywhere—TikTok, IG, Twitter, LinkedIn—but if you’re a one-man creator, you’re asking to burn out.

But YouTube is different. It builds trust.

And Substack is different. It builds depth.

Every creator I’ve ever bought from I watched videos on their channel. Not IG. Not Twitter. YouTube.

That’s why I believe in starting there. It allows your people to get to know you and your quirks. Like a real human.

Newsletters have given me a deeper look into the writer’s mind that I can’t get in scrolling brain rot.

Learn to be permission-less

I have two channels.

My main channel has over 200 subscribers but I got burnt out with editing and keeping up on social media.

My second one has 80 where I used to record cinematic vlogs, workout videos, and philosophical talks inspired by the 2010s-era fitness YouTubers.

I thought that was cool, but nobody cared. And for growth—it didn’t make any sense.

But for me, it made a ton of sense, because I was putting in the reps.

I didn’t care about judgment at the time.

But now that I have become self-conscious in a way, I stopped recording those videos and I started thinking:

“Oh wait, I need to try this angle or that strategy,” and all this stuff.

But what has it done for me?

I’m back on YouTube with a third channel trying to start again. Let’s not talk about how many times I’ve renamed my newsletter…

So if this is you, I’m gonna help you out.

I’m gonna give you permission to post a video or letter today and not worry about anyone judging you, and not worry about the metrics or anything like that.

Because none of it matters for the growth of the person you’re becoming.

Ultimately, you’re gonna gain the skill of speaking on video or writing good reads—as long as you stay consistent.

And when you’re ready, take that momentum and don’t stop. My problem is that I gain momentum and then I lose it (a habit that needs breaking).

Something interesting comes along, or I feel like I’ve gotten bored of it. It’s the “valley of death” when you start a new interest. You get excitement and dopamine, and then all of a sudden it stops being fun.

You start to kind of crash, and then you quit.

But that’s the part where you have to stick through it because you’re gonna see success on the other side of that dip.

And this is where your consistency comes in.

Forget your fear, we’re all gonna die.

Start messy. Like a dumb buffoon who can’t tell his ass from his armpit.

Make it frictionless.

2 weeks ago, I started a 21-day challenge: one video a day, no fancy edits. You get better by doing. And when you compare video 1 to video 21, you’ll see growth—and that builds confidence.

Don’t tell anyone about your channel or newsletter. Create a new one if you must.

And just let the algorithm do its thing if that’s what you’re worried about.

Feel free to join me. Comment “START” and I’ll send you the guide. We’ll keep each other accountable.

Because it’s too easy to quit when no one’s watching.

And it’s too easy to ghost when you feel like everyone’s watching.

These are the levels you can try, so it’s gamified.

• Easy: 21 days.

• Normal: 66 days (habit-forming).

• Hard: 90 days (where you hit escape velocity).

You don’t need to be the best to begin. But you do need to begin to get better.

Stay clear, calm, and creative,

Brand Marz.

P.S.

My creative goal is to post videos consistently. I’m 14 videos in as I write this.

On top, I want to write one of these weekly and I have the transcripts as first drafts. so there is no excuse for “writer’s block.”

Join me, so we can make this thing work. Shouldn’t take more than 4 hours per week.

Comment “start,” and let me know if you’re writing or filming.