The Day I started Slyfox Presents
The day I started Slyfox Presents.......
It was 2016, me and a friend (*Bensama) of mine got together and wanted to start a YouTube channel for gaming. After brainstorming ideas for names and making sure that gmail, twitter, YouTube channel with the same name were not already taken. We finally decided on Slyfox but that domain name was already taken, so I thought about Comedy Central and how it always says "Comedy Central Presents" and thus "Slyfox Presents" was born. I quickly bought the domain name, setup gmail, twitter and YouTube channel. Mind you, me and my friend were very new to creating videos and never have made any before. We did not get far, as soon as we started, we ended. No uploads, no videos, no nothing. Fast forward 1 year; I moved from PA to DC for a new opportunity. The unnecessary stress from my job in PA reached its peak and help came in the form of my sister, dad and best friend (*Noah). After getting situated in DC, me and Bensama started talking about making videos again via PlayStation Network . The games we played at that time was Battlefield 1 and Salt and Sanctuary. So I started recording my game (Salt and Sanctuary) fighting bosses. I watched a quick YouTube video on how to use PlayStation's video editor and started editing my first video. If you visit my channel and watch my videos, you will see the quality right away. Nothing fancy, not much editing and fumbling along the way; live and learn.
Fast forward 28 videos later, not many views on the channel but i did learn alot. After making all those videos i realized that it wasn't making me happy. After the initial rush of something new fainted, I realized that these games I was playing was just frustrating me but I kept on playing them. Playing FPS (First Person Shooters) like Battlefield and Call of Duty is almost like an addiction/habit. The enjoyment stems from interacting with people vocally online rather than playing the almost intentionally built frustrating game. As of today (June 2018), I am still playing these games under the handle name "Wisecobra2024". It's almost embarrassing to say out loud how many PS controllers that I have intentionally destroyed playing FPS games; lets just say the death toll is above 15!
I needed something else in my life that will bring more happiness to me but happiness outside of oneself only leads to emptiness and when you learn that happiness first comes from inside of yourself then you can spread and attract more of it. I thought about it for so many years, what can I do, I am only 1 person, I don't have much money, I can't think of anything, this is hard! Two years later it almost hit me like a ton of bricks. I was thinking, "there is so much negativity in this world what can I do to spread more positivity?" Well, I have a domain name which means i have a platform so why not use it to spread more positivity and love.
It took me toooo long to come to this conclusion because i was searching outside of myself for that "happiness" and didn't search inside of myself. I also fell into the trap of trying to measure up to either parents or friends or other family members and ignored my own voice, my own ideas and my own aspirations. When you try to follow someone else's idea of life and ignore your own happiness it will lead to sadness and dissatisfaction. Overcoming this GIANT obstacle seems insurmountable because we want to be acknowledged by our parents. We need to also understand that our parents have been taught a certain way, have lived and experienced a certain type of lifestyle and their beliefs stems from that knowledge. Sometime parents love you so much and want the best for you and forget to ask you a simple question; what makes you happy? Other times parents try to correct certain lessons within their kids or try to stop their kids from making same mistakes but they forget that "mistakes" is what builds experience/lessons. If you have fallen into this "trap", i can only tell you that you need to face your parent or family or friend and have a conversation with them. Both need to come to an understanding that this is your life and your experience and that you need their guidances but not their dictate; and this is the same lesson a parent needs to learn. Guide your kids, do not dictate their lives, you are leading them into future despair.
"Parents are just kids raising kids" - Dan Harmon
Sometimes people think success stems from materialistic possessions or titles. But I have seen/spoken/interacted with rich people and poor people alike and found that both are equally happy and sad, it all depends on the individual. Some people have also asserted that they have been poor and rich and they rather be rich. Well, yeah, who wouldn't want abundance in their lives.
I won't stand here and say to all of you, "follow your happiness", because sometimes we need help. Some people feel so stuck, so miserable, so depressed and can't make a change in their lives because of the uncertainty. For those I say, you need to seek help, you need a physical intervention by another person(s). If you throw out your hand, I will bet that someone is willing to grab it.
I leave you all with a video message from a great philosopher; Alan Watts
My journey to happiness continues.....
*No actual names were used