On Monday night, I posted a video on TikTok of me rolling out pasta dough. I didn’t do a voiceover because I liked the way it sounded without, and so it only took about 10 minutes to edit and share. That video has 213 views and 45 likes as of now, which I’m lucky to say is lower than usual.
But that night, as I kept scrolling through TikTok, I came across this video of someone’s dad reacting hilariously to a small piece of paper on fire floating through the air. “Oh my god! Oh my god! That is OLYMPIC!” he exclaims as Barbara Streisand by Duck Sauce plays in the background. It’s the type of video that makes TikTok so great.
Now TikTok has a feature that I had never used before where you can take audio from any video on the platform and add it over one of your videos. It’s why songs can go viral so quickly, but can also just be used to make fun mashups of a sound and video. I had never used this feature, so I thought, why not take the dad’s reaction and play it over a shot from my latest video of me putting dough through my pasta maker? Worst case, I could just delete the video in the morning if it flopped or I no longer found it funny. So I did it, and it took me about a minute to edit and post.
The resulting video is ten seconds long. As of writing this, it has 19000 views and 2472 likes. That’s wild. One of the comments has 90 likes, which is double what my previous video got!
So that’s exciting.
But anyway, I’m going to keep posting consistently once a week. I’m one away from 100 followers, so fingers crossed I’ll have more good news next week.
Progress towards goals
Along with TikTok, I’ve been doing pretty well on my goals. I’ve read every day. I’m a bit behind on my 30 minutes a day but I’ll catch up later today. I’m almost done with Robert Kiyosaki’s “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” which I’m really excited to talk about in next week’s newsletter when I do finish it, and David Sedaris’s “The Best of Me” has been a really fun and relaxing read before bed.
When it comes to being more like Harry Styles, someone commented on my viral TikTok, “WHY DOES THIS REMIND ME OF HARRY STYLES?” I’m pretty sure she was talking about the British dad’s reaction, but hey I’ll take it. I’ll count that as a win.
I haven’t done anything for my mental health, but I haven’t felt the need, so that’s good. For exploring more arts, I think I’ll work on this goal more when I get into the routine of posting on TikTok regularly. I did do this 5 minute sketch on my girlfriend’s iPad though.
I consumed just as much TikTok this week as I did last week (that is, an entire day’s worth). And if you combine that with time spent on social media / Netflix / random video games on my phone, I honestly have no idea how I manage to fit all that in with a full time job and a decent amount of sleep each night — I need to work on this.
I also haven’t had much time to code outside of work. And I also haven’t worked out once this year, which is a problem.
My main two focuses for this week will be goals 5 and 9, Work out once a week and Consume less, create more. I want to go on a bike ride as well as a 3k run, in order to catch up on this goal. I’m also going to try and keep my TikTok consumption under 20 hours this week — seems like a pretty achievable goal, but I’ll still have to be mindful about it.
What I’m currently reading
“Rich Dad Poor Dad: What the Rich Teach Their Kids about Money” by Robert Kiyosaki.
“The Empty Nest” by Sue Watson.
“The Best of Me” by David Sedaris.
Statistics
Newsletters posted: 2 (+1)
Newsletter subscribers: 14 (thank you ❤️)
TikToks posted in 2021: 2 (+2)
TikTok followers: 99 (+7)
Minutes read this week: 120
Workouts this week: 0
Hours spent on TikTok: 24 (+0)
Thanks for reading my newsletter again. If you’re new, and you found this interesting, please subscribe to keep me on top of my goals.
I’m happy that this newsletter has allowed me to be mindful. Forgetting to work out this week doesn’t feel like a failure, just something to work on more next week. That’s a lot more rewarding.
Please leave a comment if you have any suggestions or remarks you’d like to share.
See you next Sunday ❤️