How YouTube Changed My Life

What role did YouTube play in my life? What kind of people, books, or podcasts do I spend time on? Why do I strongly believe that technology can change people’s lives? You will find all the answers in this episode.

Hello everyone!

This is yours truly, Sayar Henry, and thank you for listening to another episode of my podcast.

Today, I’m going to talk about how YouTube changed my life.

Oh, but wait a minute, what is the correct pronunciation of the part that comes after You?

I mean how do you pronounce TUBE?

Is that Toob or is that Choob?

YouToob or YouChoob?

What’s the right one?

Well, if you ask me that very question, I’ll have to say both are correct.

In general, American people pronounce it as YouToob whereas British people pronounce it as YouChoob.

But the good news is if you are someone like me who is not too confined to just one particular accent, you can say it in either way, whichever makes you happy.

So, let’s just settle with that, okay? 

Now, when I say YouTube changed my life, I meant that it played a big role in shaping some parts of my life. And I know that to some of you, it might sound a bit strange or even crazy at first because in a traditional sense, life-changing experiences are often associated with people we have met or books we have read, not on modern social media platforms, right?

But throughout the last two decades, the way people think, behave, work, and learn have changed tremendously because of technology giants such as Apple, Microsoft, Google, and Facebook. And of course, the internet was, is, and will be, the ultimate driving force that accelerates all these changes.

So, it makes sense that the way a modern person gets self-improvement or life-changing experiences starts with something he or she finds on the internet.

And that’s exactly what happened to me.

Back in the years between 2009 and 2011, I was someone who thought of YouTube as a source of free entertainment. I was aware that YouTube was much more than entertainment because it already had a lot of educational content too, but it just wasn’t the way YouTube was introduced to me. Honestly speaking, most of what my friends and I actively explored on YouTube were movie trailers, music videos, fitness advice and some random vlogs that were fun to watch.

And because YouTube algorithm only recommends similar videos based on my watch history, I was almost never exposed to educational videos available on the platform.

But in 2012, when I started looking for teaching resources related to science and mathematics on YouTube, I was brought to a whole different region on the platform where most of what I saw were educational videos. That was when I was first introduced to TED talks.

Then, one night, in 2013, when I was watching language learning videos recommended by YouTube algorithm, I stumbled upon a video of an author who would later become one of the most influential persons in my life. His name is Tim Ferriss and those who are into entrepreneurship and productivity might be familiar with him already. For those of you who are hearing his name for the first time just now, I’d describe Tim Ferriss as a self-help guru who wrote The 4-Hour Workweek — a book that had been so popular throughout the past decade around the globe that almost every guy who had a dream of starting his own business had to read it. I think it’s safe to assume that every YouTuber you can find on the planet today who is into business, productivity and lifestyle design would include The 4-Hour Workweek in their lists of books that changed their lives or put it in the top of book recommendations.

And it was no exception for yours truly.

As soon as I learned about Tim Ferriss on YouTube, I watched his TED talk videos, interviews, and read almost everything I could find about him on the internet. With some luck, I found that some random YouTube channels uploaded the audiobook version of his book. I managed to download it before it got taken down by YouTube, and I started listening to it every night after I came home from work. Every now and then, I would apply tips and tricks that I learned from his book to increase my productivity at work. And because I was working two jobs at that point of my life and was trying to figure out how to transition myself into a full-time teaching career,  everything I learned from him was extremely useful to me. Without YouTube, I wouldn’t have found him and his book until many years later, and consequently, I wouldn’t have managed to turn my passion into business with the right wisdom and mindset.

But wait, things got even better.

Because I frequently watched Tim Ferriss videos on YouTube, the algorithm started recommending me to watch other great people that are in league with my favorite author.  

I happened to watch a program called Impact Theory as Tim Ferriss was on it in one episode. Although I just intended to watch Tim Ferriss being interviewed by the host, I also loved the concept of the program. I mean Impact Theory is an interview show that invites the world’s highest achievers and explores their mindsets. From the show, I learned about interesting people like Jay Shetty who is an author and a life coach and Jim Kwik who is a brain coach.

Of course, things didn’t stop there.

In 2014, Tim Ferriss started his interview-centered podcast and invited the world’s most incredible people on his show. Listening to his interviews, I got to know people like Luis Von Ahn who is the co-founder and CEO of Duolingo which some of you might know as the world’s most popular language-learning platform; and then people like Jocko Willink who is a retired Navy SEAL.

Then one thing led to another. Knowing Jocko Willink from Tim’s podcast and watching his TED talk made YouTube show me other interview style podcasts such as Joe Rogan’s. Then, watching Joe Rogan’s podcast put me in the path to get to know Jordan Peterson, a well-known professor of psychology who is one of the top intellectuals of our time. All thanks to YouTube and its algorithm.

So, for me, watching YouTube alone had opened my eyes like 10 times just by introducing me to the world’s highest achievers in their respective fields. As I spent a lot of time with them and follow their work over the years, they became my mentors. Among all the names I have mentioned earlier, there are three people I spent most of my time with. I would say that Tim Ferriss, to me, obviously, is like a big brother who I look up to. Jocko Willink would be an uncle who wants me to toughen up and be humble at the same time. And then Jordan Peterson would be a fatherly figure that encourages me to take more responsibilities and to be more matured by giving his wisdoms. 

And there is another crucial part that I haven’t told you yet.

Before I was exposed to this league of world-class achievers, I was not sure which direction of teaching career I should head for. I mean it was difficult for me to decide whether I should teach science & math or teach English as I love these areas equally. But after being exposed to this invaluable education on YouTube and seeing the impact it had on my life firsthand, I realized that it was my language skill that helped me absorb and digest these effectively. And when I talked to young people and language learners in Myanmar, it was shocking that most of them cannot understand such content directly because they had poor listening skill. It was then I realized that I had to do something about the poor listening skill of Myanmar students. In another word, it was the driving force behind the creation of Ear Training Course, which eventually was introduced to the students in 2015.

Now you see why I said in the beginning of this episode that YouTube played a big role in shaping some parts of my life. If it weren’t for YouTube, my life would have been different. The trajectory of my teaching career, at least, wouldn’t be the same.

Based on this experience and perspective, whenever I’m asked the question of what can change a person, I always say three things: books, people, and technology.

Some of you might still argue that it was actually people and their books that truly changed my life and technology had nothing to do with it. But if you consider the timing of when I should be exposed to these books and people in my life, the story would turn out differently. Without technology, without internet, without YouTube, it would probably take a decade or more to have myself introduced to all these people and books. And by then, I might not be interested to be a language teacher anymore, or I might already be in a different career path from which I cannot return.

But technology made these available to me at the right time, at the right age. And now, technology has taken out the timing issue from the equation. Look around.

Things that I get to learn in my 30s are equally available to those in their 20s, making them smarter and wiser, much earlier than in my generation.

If that doesn’t prove technology has touched and changed people’s lives, I don’t know what will.

For me, it changed my life.

Of course, I only use the word “change”, not “improve”.

Who knows if the path I chose was for better or worse?

Perhaps it’s for you and for my students to decide.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is the end of this episode. Thank you so much for spending time with me and I hope you come back for more. Goodbye for now.