Burned out? There’s a better way to stay motivated as a creator

^{Hey there, Creator! I am Kenzi Wood. Thanks for tuning in, and welcome if you're new to this corner of the internet. I never take your time and attention for granted, and I'm grateful you're here.}

From 2015 to 2018, I had a side hustle as a content creator. It wasn’t anything huge, but I had a dedicated audience I adored (along with an aggressive daily posting schedule). In 2018, I hit a wall. 😫Keeping up with DMs, editing photos, and creating content was just too much. Truthfully, I had been burning the candles at both ends for a while.

I ignored all the signs of burnout until I crashed and burned. I stopped posting immediately, and my audience was less than thrilled. I actually stepped away from creating entirely after that, too burned out to deal with the exhaustion of being in the spotlight. 💡

Looking back now, I realized I lost my motivation. Instead of creating just for fun, I let my obsession with growth go to my head. Instead of saying, “What do I want to make?”, I focused too much on, “What will perform well?”

Whether you’re new to being a creator or have been in the game for years, motivation matters more than you might realize. Before you know it, you can slip from intrinsic to extrinsic motivation, create for the wrong reasons, and burn out just as your personal brand starts taking off. (I know from experience)💥

Let’s look at how intrinsic and extrinsic motivation work for creators and how you can use this psychological trick to love creating again.

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In my college psychology class, we learned that motivation falls into two buckets:

I’m not saying one is better than the other. We actually need both types of motivation. The problem for creators happens when we let extrinsic motivation dominate everything. When that happens, the thing you used to enjoy starts to feel like an obligation you can’t escape.

There’s another idea called the overjustification effect. It happens when you add external rewards to something you already enjoy. When you do that, your intrinsic motivation can actually decrease. 📉

So the more you chase performance metrics, the less satisfying the work is.

That’s why your most strategic content can feel draining, even when it performs well.

It’s also why hitting your goals doesn’t always feel as good as you expected.

Nothing’s wrong with you. Your brain is just responding exactly the way it’s wired to.

But over time, you stop doing the things that made creating enjoyable in the first place, and you burn out. That doesn’t mean you’re lazy or undisciplined. You just need to rethink your motivations.

Sometimes taking a break will help you reconnect with your intrinsic motivation, but not always. Disappearing for three weeks isn’t the answer to everything, but these tips can help you rediscover your deeper reasons for creating. 💙

Look at the last ten things you’ve posted and ask:

Some pieces will stand out as energizing, and a few will feel like a chore. That last group is usually where burnout is coming from. 📍

One of the fastest ways to burn out is to remove all sense of play from your work. So you need to bring back content that doesn’t carry any pressure. 🛝

That might look like:

A lot of creators get frustrated because they expect every post to do everything at once. Who says you have to?

Some content can be designed specifically for growth. It follows proven formats, leans into what works, and aims for reach.

Other content can exist purely to express something. It might be more personal, more experimental, or just more fun to make.

When you permit yourself to have both, you stop resenting your strategy because it’s no longer your entire creative identity.

Extrinsic motivation depends on delayed feedback. You post something, then wait to see how it performs. Intrinsic motivation works differently. It’s about enjoying the process in real time.☺️

Instead of focusing only on how something performs after you post it, pay attention to how it feels while you’re making it. That might mean slowing down while filming a video, taking more breaks at an event, or inviting friends over to chat while you do a kitchen photoshoot.

Yeah, metrics still matter, but if they’re your only measure of success, you’re going to feel stuck. Instead of treating your YouTube analytics as the end-all, be-all, start tracking internal metrics, too.

Something like whether you said something you actually believe, made something you’re proud of, or created something you’d genuinely share with a friend. I know it sounds a little woo-woo, but how you frame your performance can have a big impact on motivation. 💪

Burnout made me walk away from creating for a long time. If you’re also feeling burnt out and exhausted, it doesn’t mean you’re doing a bad job or that you’re lazy. It usually means external pressure has taken over your life without enough internal motivation to support it.

You can (and should) still care about results, but they can’t be the only thing that drives you. The best creators aren’t just the ones who optimize the heck out of their feeds, but the ones who figure out how to keep going while having fun.

Pick one piece of content and make it purely because you want to. Don’t optimize it or try to predict how it will perform. Just focus on whether it feels interesting or fun to create.

Did you feel more energized or excited? Good—keep going! That’s a sign of healthy motivation.

As always, hit reply if something in here hits home.
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Speak soon,
Kenzi

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