We recently connected with Ryan Leach and have shared our conversation below.
Ryan, we’re so excited for our community to get to know you and learn from your journey and the wisdom you’ve acquired over time. Let’s kick things off with a discussion on self-confidence and self-esteem. How did you develop yours?
There’s both good news and bad news about how I developed confidence to be on camera: it took a lot of practice. That’s good news, because I believe anyone can do it. But of course, the inherent bad news is that it takes work and a lot of time. I wish I could tell people the magic trick to be more confident, but if it exists, I’m not aware of it.
I used to be terrified to speak on camera. I remember recording a promotional video for a music company I worked with years ago. I recorded take after take after take, stumbled my words, second-guessed what I was saying, and was clearly awkward and nervous. Eventually, I got the video done, but it was painful.
When I started my YouTube channel, it wasn’t any better. I felt awkward and uncomfortable speaking to a camera, especially knowing that once I posted the video online, it could be seen by countless people. Thanks to an inspirational video from productivity YouTuber Ali Abdaal, I mustered up the courage and uploaded the video anyway. Then I did another one. And another one. And dozens more.
I can’t say exactly how many videos it took, but with enough practice and repetition, recording videos started to become less stressful and more habitual. Once I started getting positive feedback, it even started to become fun!
I’ve finally reached a point where I can hit record on my camera and immediately launch into the video, no sweat. I use a teleprompter, and most of the time, I record my scripts in a single take. And I feel relaxed and at ease the entire time I’m doing it! If you had told me I would be comfortable speaking on camera five years ago, I would not have believed you.
Just like how reading about swimming doesn’t make you a better swimmer, and you have to actually get in the pool and put in the strokes, becoming more confident is something that you can develop by jumping in time and time again until it becomes second nature.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I write music for film and TV, and I run a YouTube channel all about the craft of writing music. I make videos about music theory, how to compose for orchestras, interviews with professional composers, and any other topics I can find to help people learn to write music.
I’ve always been fascinated with figuring out what makes great music so good, and the videos are an outlet for me to share my discoveries as well as motivation for me to keep going.
Besides the YouTube videos I also make courses about music composition, with my most recent course Pillars of Composition II all about how to write longer pieces of music.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
1. Persistence – There was a point where I thought 40 subscribers was the highest I was ever going to hit. But that didn’t matter, I was having so much fun making videos that I just kept on going anyway. My wife thought YouTube was just another hobby that I was dabbling in until I got bored with it, but I tried to convince her that this one was different. After the channel blew up my a fluke hit video she believed me! Many of those early videos were really rough around the edges while I was still figuring out what I was doing. But I kept on making them, and that’s the only reason I ended up finding success with the channel.
2. Gamification – I honestly don’t pay hardly any attention to analytics these days, but in the early days of my channel I was obsessed! The “gamification” of YouTube, where you can track things like how many subscribers a specific video brought in, made it really easy to “play against myself”. Each new video was a chance to one-up my last one, and see if I could do even better. It made it fun, and pushed me to keep going and try new things.
3. Taking the leap – I waffled for years about making video content. I knew it was a good idea, but I procrastinated like crazy. That Ali Abdaal video I mentioned in the other section finally gave me the kick in the pants I needed to say “screw it” and upload my first video. I talk to a lot of people who “want” to start a YouTube channel but spend all their time worrying about cameras, graphics, and all sorts of other unimportant things. The only important thing is to upload that first video and keep uploading, the rest will take care of itself.
How would you spend the next decade if you somehow knew that it was your last?
It’s a lot of fun building something, but it can be a whole other challenge to maintain it after it’s built. I have a tendency to jump from new interest to new interest, always getting that rush of excitement from learning new things and seeing immediate progress. I’m not so good at sticking with it for the long haul!
So now that the “building” phase of my YouTube channel is over, I have to find ways to keep myself motivated to keep it thriving and growing. This is true both for my own involvement in the channel, but of course even more so for the audience if I want people to still pay attention.
Rekindling the excitement of the early days of building the channel is a challenge I’m definitely facing right now.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://ryanleach.com
- Twitter: @ryanleachmusic
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@RyanLeach
- Other: http://12storymusic.com
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