Create More Than You Consume

Because You Can't Impact the World Until You Put Some of Yourself into It

I have spent a good part of the past four years developing a love for podcasts, authors, and influencers — for creators, and especially for people on the cutting edge.

The cutting edge of what, you ask?

Anything that could help me become better. I’m drawn to people who can articulate complex ideas with passion, particularly when those things can be applied to improve my life of the lives of people around me.

I listened to Andrew Huberman to to keep up with health science, Dave Asprey for biohacking, Lex Friedman to learn more about humanity, Andy Frisella for grit and business, Peter Attia for longevity, Rangan Chatterjee for feel-good wellness tips and tools, and Gary Vee for marketing and content — to name a few. My relentless listening centered primarily on content in the nutrition, wellness, and personal development space - with some content in entrepreneurship, technology, and science thrown in for good measure.

I took every opportunity to fill my ears with someone else’s voice.

I would listen while I worked out. I would listen while I cooked, while I drove, and while I fell asleep. There seemed to be a never ending stream (Sorry, I couldn’t help myself) of content to consume. With my podcast queue growing longer and longer, I took every opportunity to fill my ears with someone else’s voice. I sped up the audio to get through more episodes, usually clocking in at minimum speed of 2X, and sometimes as high as 3X, depending on the speaking cadence of the host and guest.

The Turning Point

At first, I loved this new hobby. I was learning constantly, picking up all kinds of new tools and strategies that I could apply immediately to my life. I felt focused, informed, excited, and yet always behind.

Why pick and choose episodes, I thought, when every new release could have some small gem of information that would change your life? Listening became like a drug, providing the dopamine hit of productivity when in reality, I may have done nothing productive at all.

It took more than a year for me to realize that this wasn’t entirely a positive change in my life. In reality, my new hobby had stolen some of my productive time, but worse it had stolen the quiet from my mind. I never allowed the opportunity for my mind to sit idle. As much as I loved the torrent of new information, I started to miss the feeling of quiet reflection that leads to creativity. I’m sure some of you have felt this too, in our society so full of distractions, the lack of empty space in which your mind can roam.

My new hobby had stolen some of my productive time, but worse
it had stolen the quiet in my mind.

The Drive to Create

I started to leave the headphones off, on occasion. I let my mind wander instead of leading it on a constant intellectual audio journey. Where it went, given this freedom, surprised me. I started to fixate on phrases or concepts that would pop into my head in reaction to a scenario in the real world.

I would think back on patterns that I had observed in my personal or professional life and analyze them. I would debate with myself on how best I could describe those patterns. I thought about what strategies from the thousands of hours of content I had consumed could be applied to quell negative patterns or cultivate positive ones.

I had spent all this time consuming content, not just learning the lessons shared, but also absorbing the flow, syntax, and patterns - what kind of information is valuable to share, and how is it structured? Now that I was giving my mind time to breath, I began to think that maybe I, too, have something valuable to say.

Maybe the lessons I have learned throughout life can help others?

Maybe I can become a mentor, just as my squadron of podcast hosts had become mentors to me. It’s been mentioned by several of these hosts that they know people consume their content and don’t do anything with it. Despite the fact that I was actively applying some of the lessons from the content to my life, I always felt called out by that line. I realized that for me, it wasn’t enough.

While it doesn’t guarantee success to release your creation into the world,
it certainly guarantees failure not to

One of the phrases that stuck in my mind, recurring enough times that I finally felt the need to write it down, was “Create more than you consume.”

It felt important that I repeat that phrase to myself, explore it, justify it, and understand it. It became a new tenet on life, an imperative to follow. It was a high order, with as much content as I had been consuming at that point, but it drove me to find a balance. I started to take in less content and be more selective about what made it into my listening queue. I spent more time in silence, to be present in the world and open to my meandering mind and the things it would find.

The idea isn’t to spew nonsense into the world for the sake of creation, but to create because doing so has the potential to impact other people.

Creating more than you consume doesn’t need to be restricted to content alone. Create art, cook for yourself, create something at work - a report, a program, a presentation. Create something physical if you can. Create relationships. Hell, if you’re in the right place in your life for it, create a baby.

In truth, the only restriction on your creation is that what you create matters to you. The idea isn’t to spew nonsense into the world for the sake of creation, but to create because doing so has the potential to impact other people, and because creating feels good, meaningful, even responsible.

It's taken me far longer than I'd like to admit to actually take the first step toward producing content in a way that can be placed in front of people.

Of course, some time is required for preparation, but if I'm honest with myself, the vast majority of my hesitation has been for fear that what I have to say won’t resonate. I still fear it. I don’t think that will change, but at a certain point you have to put your content out there and let the people decide.

Every great author, artist, and influencer has made this choice at some point in their lives, and while it doesn’t guarantee success to release your creation into the world, it certainly guarantees failure not to.

If I'm honest with myself, the vast majority of my hesitation has been for fear that what I have to say won’t resonate. I still fear it.

Now, when I encounter one of those phrases or concepts that lodge in my head like a catchy song, I embrace it.

I ponder over the phrase, coming up with linked ideas until I start to worry the my head is so full of swirling thoughts that some will fall out. Then, I write them down as quickly as possible. These thoughts become the start of my articles, which I expand on and refine over time until they mature. My content on Ever Intentional covers what I've learned, some through experience, some through research, and some through audio mentors whom I feel I know so well, but have never met. I hope that parts of my writing will resonate with you, and that it helps you to live just a little more intentionally.

Tell me, what is it that you know you should create, but maybe haven’t been ready for? What holds you back? Are you, like me, consuming much more content than you create? Tell me if you’ve experienced what I have, and if you’re still in it, or if you’ve taken the next steps and started to create.