My Life Purpose: Raising Humanity's Consciousness Through Storytelling

[Wyeth]

After 22 years of life and over 3 years of spiritual work, I have finally made clear my Life Purpose: Raising Humanity’s Consciousness Through Storytelling.

From a young age I have always had a knack for storytelling, as I have always been one to daydream in class and imagine countless fascinating fictional scenarios. When I was 5 years old I would create little pocket books with drawings and a caption at the bottom of page that told a story as you flipped through the pages. In elementary school I won multiple awards for stories I had written…my mom told me I could be a great writer one day and that idea has never left me. I wrote some more fiction in high school (never showed anybody, it’s cringe lol), and in this past year I have written a couple short stories that have received positive praise from the people I have shown it to, one of which was a creative writing major herself. I have also from a young age filmed random skits with my friends and even worked on a couple higher production level short films with one of my friends who is studying film. 

And through all of this, whichever medium it may be, I am just absolutely in love with the storytelling aspect. I want to create deeply moving, consciousness tickling work that makes the reader/viewer’s jaw drop, make them think about reality in a radically different way, and/or leave them inspired to improve their lives and raise their consciousness. 

Some movies that gave me these feelings are: Interstellar, Annihilation, Arrival, Blade Runner 2049

Some books that left me these feelings are: Beyond Azara by Martin Ball, The Solandarian Game by Martin Ball, Beneath a Scarlett Sky by Mark Sullivan, Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman…and I’m sure there’s more I can’t remember right now.

Phase 1 of the actualization of this Life Purpose is starting a new Youtube Channel. I have already created a Youtube channel before (search "The Curious Minds") and I had solid success, amassing over 35,000 subscribers and making more than $10,000 total on that project in a 2.5 year span…so I know the ins and outs of Youtube, how the algorithm works, how to keep the viewer engaged, how to build a community. 

I am going to take it next level with the content I am going to create. Not just next level…but world class. Given that I already have multiple years of experience creating topic, I have confidence I can reach world class level within 1-2 years of starting this project. I’ve saved several thousand dollars already so that I can purchase high quality computer, camera, microphone, etc. I am going to weave in storytelling into my videos…short skits that are about whatever topics the video is on. For example I have an idea for a video, with tentative title “Radical Honesty - How to Transform Your Life by Telling the Truth.” The video would start with a 4 or 5 minute skit depicting how a guy puts himself into a mental prison with the lies he tells…then when the skit reaches a stopping point I would come onto the screen in a sit-down setting and talk about the concept of Radical Honesty for several more minutes…and then then story would continue again, and then at a stopping point I would talk about Radical Honesty some more. I envision each video being somewhere between 20 and 40 minutes, maybe some even up to an hour…I keep having the deep feeling of trust that If I grind and put in the work, that this channel will grow a big and loyal following. 

It’s not just the channel either…it’s a whole ass business. I have spent probably over 100 hours now researching one-person business models and I think I am pretty clear now on how I am going to pull this off. I am going to funnel my audience to my community online, where I will have my own website, which will contain my newsletter…as well as 1-on-1 coaching…another thing on the coaching part…I have gained some experience with therapy skills and life coaching in the past year or so (I am a psychology major) and I have loved it. So if I could pull this off…make my creative content online and also have some coaching clients on the side…fuck that would be the dream come true. Eventually I want to sell other products on my website too, I already have dozens of ideas for products that I won’t say because I don’t want anyone to steal the idea…but I will say one of them could be a Self-Actualizaton journal that is filled with prompts and practices to help one find meaning in life and move one closer towards discovering/carrying out their Life Purpose. 

But yeah, that is the general plan outline for Phase 1. I imagine that building this business will take up most of my waking hours for the next couple years, so I need to get ready to grind and make sure I am in peak mental fitness each and every day. As soon as I am able, my plan is to buy a plot of land with a couple friends in relative close proximity to a national park (my two friends and I have “sworn” that we will do this) and build 6-10 yurts on the land and rent out on AirBnb. If this plan goes well, these two business projects will make me a very well off person financially and give me immense freedom in life.

Once I am financially free is when Phase 2 begins (I am 22 right now and realistically I think this could happen before I am 30). Phase 2 is when I dive deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep into the spiritual work, hell maybe even Leo level deep…and then with my newfound level of consciousness and my mastery in the art of storytelling I will be able to tell the most profound stories humanity has ever heard…I don’t even know if that many people would read them because the level of consciousness of humanity is so low, but I wouldn’t even care because I woud be financially free and not trying to change my stories to make a buck. 

Also sidenote I have been writing streams of consciousness multiple times weekly on a single document for over 5 years and this document contains several hundreds of thousands of words. Near the end of my life I plan to release the entire writings from that document that contain my most wicked, fucked up thoughts that people would hate me for but also contain the thoughts that make me a vehicle of love for humanity and I will title it something like “The Raw Human”

But anyways that is the outline for my LP. The vision has been getting clearer and clearer for some time, and now it is finally crystal clear now that a busy ass quarter of college (don’t even really know why i am in college anymore lol but I’m about to graduate this year so finishing it out) is over and now that I have separated from my gf who took up a lot of my time, giving me clarity of mind to think about my next step in life (thank god),

Much love everyone, just wanted to share. See you at the top!

Feedback is appreciated, as well as potential blindspots that people might be able to point out.

 

Edited December 12, 2022 by Wyeth

[Leo Gura]

Very good overall.

However, I fail to see how your coaching channel/website/service is aligned with storytelling.

Why not get more directly to the storytelling, if that's what you love so much?

You seem to be hedging between self-help teacher vs storytelling, which are really two LPs.

Edited December 12, 2022 by Leo Gura

[Wyeth]

@Leo Gura

Glad to hear from you Leo. Thank you

My highest priority is being of service to humanity and helping people raise their consciousness…and I believe given my unique mind and skillset I can best do this through storytelling.

The way I see it is that I need to have complete financial independence and freedom so that I can have the time to do the spiritual work that would yield the highest consciousness insights in the stories (most likely a book, maybe a film).

Going straight into writing a book or creating short films and posting them on Youtube or even creating a business around storytelling (perhaps this is something I can ponder more) seems much more high risk than creating a Youtube Channel and business that blends storytelling into Self-Help Spirituality. I have already had success on Youtube before, and I know I can create wayyyy higher quality content than what I created before, and I really enjoyed doing it!…so this feels like the naturally thing to follow.

Yes, I love storytelling and see that as my Grand Life Purpose, but I also love self-help/spirituality too, and in the experience I had with coaching in this past year, I really enjoyed it and the people I worked with made solid improvement and enjoyed me as a mentor…so I believe I can have the best of both worlds. Create the business that is already centered around things I enjoy that includes storytelling, which will eventually lead me to Phase 2 of my LP which will be my greatest life’s work.

[Leo Gura]

That could work, just be careful not to lose sight of your storytelling.

It's gonna be difficult to transition from teaching & self-help into proper storytelling because they are quite different skill sets. Success in the spiritual/self-help/coaching field will not make you a good storyteller by itself. You're still gonna struggle to write a novel or make a film. If you want to make great novels or films, you gotta work directly on that.

So really get clear about your end-goal with storytelling.

Edited December 12, 2022 by Leo Gura

[axiom]

@Wyeth If you want to get very wealthy by running a glamping site(s), then you will need to dedicate much more time, effort and shrewdness than you currently consider will be the case. It is not easy to become rich this way. The market is saturated and competitive. The overheads are not insignificant. Unless your time horizon is fifteen years or longer, and you're prepared to live on the breadline as you pump all of the profits back into the business to grow it, secure additional sites etc... then it is more likely to end up simply being a lifestyle business (enough to pay the bills and socialise a bit perhaps, but not a way to get rich or even that comfortable). Bear in mind that life will happen to you as well over this period (kids, illness, depression, other "black swan" events). I'm being realistic here.

If you want to write, then write.

Running a business has a habit of becoming your life. It rewires your brain. It can be a bit like a self-built prison that you have to work like hell to escape from. You are already of the mindset that "what you really want from life" can come later. This is an attitude entrepreneurs willingly employ... but if your heart realistically lies in more artistic pursuits, this can actually be nothing more than a way of fulfilment-avoidance due to unnoticed or undealt-with feelings of inadequacy, i.e. "my writing has to be world-shatteringly good / genius-level, or there is no point at all".

The "no point at all" part typically leads to a life of procrastination and seeking of other distractions over a potentially very long time frame. 

If you are serious about writing, then my advice is to get a job and hone your writing in your spare time. Not too many genius-level writers were also successful business people in some prior life.

If you're convinced you want to go the other route, you probably need to add an additional ten or even twenty years to your current estimates.

[Pharion]

Hey Wyeth. Thanks for sharing your plans with us. I can tell you are skilled at writing by how easy and enjoyable it was to read your post. I haven't been active on this forum for months, but on intuition, I decided to check it, clicked your post, and was struck by how many similarities I noticed between us! I'm 22, a writing major in uni, and very interested in becoming financially independent and living off of my own work as a creator.

Another thing that I related to about your story was being highly creative since childhood. I'd work on comics, drawings, and since high school, I've been creating and running dungeons and dragons-style RPGs for my group of friends. The Life Purpose I'm currently set on is to be a novelist. I view storytelling as a sacred and essential way of opening people's hearts and minds, and I believe that deep spiritual truth is the in the DNA of good stories. Plus, I just fucking love creating stories!

I'm currently in the last stages of writing my first novel, with more planned after that. It's honestly hard right now to imagine making a living from it. I guess your confidence comes from the fact that you've already had some success on youtube. The most I can do right now is trust the process, but it helps a lot to have some positivity and others who believe in you. I love having other creators in my circle to collaborate with and share ideas. If you feel the same way, let me know. Either way, best of luck with your LP! I hope to see your work in the future.

[Wyeth]

@axiom Thank you for your response, Axiom. 

Your words do ground me a bit. It has been a theme in my life that I believe I can do too much in a too short period of time and then I get disappointed that I don't end up doing all the things I had planned. I don't want that theme to occur in my LP.

I will contemplate more and listen to my intuition on what the heart feeling is, do I want to jump straight into storytelling? Or is this self-help/spiritual business (that does weave in storytelling heavily) a better way to go?...I've had success online in the past, really enjoyed doing it and was fulfilled by it, and know that I can be much higher quality than I was before...my initial feeling tells me this route will lead me to more freedom later on.

The way I see it is that even if I don't start taking writing novels seriously until I am 35, I'll still have 40-50+ years to go all in on the craft. I don't view my current business plan as a type of fulfillment-avoidance...the prospect of jumping into it deeply excites me, but you're right in that it has a potential to become a prison that makes it hard to escape from. Don't want to get trapped. Will contemplate this more.

As for the glamping site project, I don't view that as the means to become wealthy...perhaps I should have specified that more in my original post. I'm not trying to build an AirBnb empire here. I would expect to make far more money from the business. Like you said, that project is something I see as paying for the bulk of my living expenses. I live a fairly frugal lifestyle now and I don't expect that to really change all that much as I accumulate more $...I view it as the more money I make, the more money I can save and/or invest in my projects. I don't think it is unrealistic to expect that I would be occupied with glamping site maintenance (given that there are a couple other friends on the project as well) for about 8-10 hours per week, leaving lots and lots of time to work on the business. 

I am also glad you brought up other life events that would effect my ability to work on these projects. I know I definitely do not want kids until I am at least 35 or 40, and there's quite a good chance I decide to never have kids. But romantic relationships will be a factor along the path the entire time, as for the time being I see myself being single for awhile, but it is very likely the desire to have a partner there will come into play, which could change things. 

Lots to think about! Thank you for your thoughts Axiom

 

 

 

[Wyeth]

@Pharion Glad to hear from you. Wow, it does sound like we have a lot of similarities with our creative minds.

And good job on almost finishing your first novel! What is it about?

Yeah, that was my main concern about going straight into writing novels...it is so hard to make a living off it. Most people don't realize how extraordinarily difficult it is to make it as an author. Making it as an author has got to be one of the lowest success rates of any other professional endeavor.

The thing with my work is that I want to be able to write completely freely and not care if my work makes it to the New York Times Bestseller list or not. Two books that moved me extremely deeply (mentioned in original post) were Beyond Azara and The Solandarian Game by Martin Ball. I doubt those books have even sold 2,000 copies, and the everyday person would not understand its spiritual themes at all. But those books are fucking masterpieces, and I want to create work like that. I don't want to change my ideas and cater to the masses just so I can survive, which is why I believe this business is necessary for me to create first. 

[axiom]

@Wyeth No problem. I also wanted to become a film director or writer or artist. I went into business instead, and for similar reasons to those you've outlined here. I became wealthy but I did not become happy nor fulfilled. 

[Pharion]

@Wyeth Thank you. "Childhood best friends Blay and Khorial will do anything to save their dying world. But when Blay discovers that Khorial has been tampering with blood-magic, they fight to Khorial’s death. Khorial is brought back by the Red Star, an entity who could give him the power to change the world. Now, Blay and Khorial lead armies against each other, but their fates hang on the strings of ancient enemies engaged in a struggle for survival."

From a spiritual perspective, the Red Star is a being of pure ego who wants to gain control and eliminate threats to itself. Many characters succumb to its offers of power, but the story is ultimately about how they overcome it. It's called "The Starslayer's Chronicle." 

In regards to making a living, I'm opting for a very different approach. Personally, I don't think there needs to be a compromise between good, spiritually truthful storytelling and market appeal; though I also respect and understand your desire to be concerned with market appeal in your writing. I would ultimately like to make a living from it, but it will probably take many years of dedicated work before the returns come. While most aspiring authors fail to make a living, I don't believe it's an unwise endeavour. It's not a lottery. Rather, you get out what you put in. If you stay committed and keep improving and putting in the work, success is inevitable. 

In the meantime, though, my approach is to live within my means and work part-time as needed to support myself. I am interested in the "one-man business" model: creating valuable content, building an audience, then funnelling that audience to your work. It seems that increasingly, self-promo and having an online following is one of the best launch pads for new authors to begin getting eyeballs on their work and the first sales which get the ball rolling. 

I'm curious about what kind of research you did or what makes you confident that you can build an audience that way. Is it really as simple as just making high-quality content and putting it out for free? "Build it and they will come"? If you have any advice or resources, I'd love to hear them. I have no presence on youtube, TikTok, Twitter, or anything.