Content Creation Hack: Steal From Yourself
One time, I was watching one of my old videos back.
I liked it but didn’t love it.
Was rambling too much.
I thought:
‘Fam, you made the video 13 minutes, but it could have easily been 6 minutes.’
After watching the video, I went about my day.
I spent the next few hours thinking of what I was going to publish in my newsletter that evening.
Every now and then, I am flowing with ideas.
But on this particular day, I was shooting blanks.
I had no clue what to write about.
The hours flew by.
Finally, the time had arrived.
I sat in my workstation, opened my laptop & was greeted by a blank page.
I didn’t know how to fill up that blank page.
Should I not write anything?
Thus far, I had published in my newsletter daily for 1000+ days.
Was today the day the streak ended?
Suddenly, I had an idea!
Why not redo that YouTube video that I was complaining about earlier?
You know.. the video that could have been 6 minutes but ended up dragging on for 13 minutes.
How about I get the 6 minutes worth of points and write a newsletter on it?
That’s exactly what I did.
I stole from myself.
Who Can Steal From Themselves?
If you just began creating content, then stealing from yourself may not make much sense.
Because you’re in the early stages.
Be patient, grasshopper.
Once you have built up a body of work, some fear may kick in:
‘Geez, I’ve talked about so many ideas. What if I run out?’
This is when you will learn a creativity law (hopefully):
- The more ideas that you create, the more ideas that you can create.
Stealing from yourself is possible once you have a library of content.
Hopefully, this library occupies different platforms:
- Blog + YouTube channel
- Twitter + Podcast
- Blog + YouTube channel + Twitter + Newsletter
The more the merrier!
3 Ways to Steal From Yourself
The perfect day to steal from yourself is when you are shooting blanks.
You have no clue what to write.
Once you stumble into a day like that, here are a few ways to steal.
1. Sharpen the Message
This is the strategy that I mentioned earlier.
Where I took the 6 minutes of points from that YouTube video and converted it into a newsletter.
There are plenty of times you may have rambled.
Back then, your thoughts on the topic were hazy.
As you read your past content back, you are much more astute on what is important and what is not.
Strip the signal from the noise.
Then articulate the signal into a new medium.
2. Unique Angles
One time, I talked about why people have a shaky voice when they are giving a speech.
A large reason is due to speech anxiety.
When you’re nervous, your voice shakes.
The fix was:
- Rather than focusing on getting the audience to like you.
- Focus more on providing value to the audience.
The correct framing melts away the nerves.
And the voice returns back to normal.
I thought this was the end of the shaky voice content from the ArmaniTalks brand.
But I was wrong.
Later, I discovered another reason for a shaky voice.
Poor body language & sloppy breathing.
That’s when I got creative.
When practicing your speech, do a couple of pushups before your talk.
Willingly make your heart beat fast.
Then give your talk.
This will force you to fix your posture and breathe through the huffing & puffing as you speak.
The nervous system will recalibrate and you will have the correct posture on speech day.
As you can tell, I took 2 different angles on the same topic.
- For the 1st angle, I resolved the shaky voice issue from a framing lens.
- For the 2nd angle, I resolved the shaky voice issue from a physical lens.
3. Logic to Anecdotes & Anecdotes to Logic
Imagine that you wrote a piece about why discipline leads to happiness.
Your piece is very logical.
You gave a systematic breakdown of why discipline can take someone out of a rut.
One day, you are out of inspiration.
You have no clue what to create.
Here’s an idea.
How about you tell a story about when discipline led to happiness?
Share an anecdote that will bring your previous logical breakdown to life.
Talk about that time when you went through your divorce.
When you heard the shocking news, the first thing to go was work.
You sat at home with the lights off, watched TV, and ate a bunch of snacks.
Days turned into weeks & weeks turned into months.
Soon, you were getting heavy & your face was getting puffy.
One day, your brother gave you some tough love & talked you into going to the gym.
The weights took you out of your head & bought you back to the present moment.
After a solid lifting session, you felt good.
The gym had ripple effects on other parts of your life.
You began meal prepping, sleeping properly, cutting off alcohol, etc.
The discipline took you out of your funk.
Now you were fit and happy.
Stealing vs Repackaging Content
‘Hey Armani, is stealing from yourself the same as content repackaging?’
No.
You can automate content repackaging.
But you can’t automate stealing from yourself because your perception is required.
Since you were the creator of these content pieces, only you know what the relevant points are.
You know the unique twists that you can take.
That’s not something a Fiver contractor from the Philippines can do.
I like to view stealing from yourself as investing in yourself.
You begin to see the invisible.
In the future, when you consume your past content back, you start to see what could have been there instead.
Then you create a future piece about what could have been there instead.
The more you steal from yourself, the more you solidify your faith in the creativity law:
The more ideas you generate, the more ideas you’re capable of generating.
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– ArmaniTalks 
