My First Livestream Experience

I refuse to say 'story time' so this isn't a storytime. I'm not one of those Youtubers. This is merely my experience. 

I wanted to try live-streaming for a while. I thought it looked like fun. But I didn't want to stream video games or things like that, merely because I am horrible at video games, and watching me fail at a video game would not be fun to watch 😅 I thought watching me do art or scrapbooking, things like that, would be more fun. So, I asked for and got a tripod for my birthday. 

It's not fancy. I don't have a fancy camera. I used my phone and my laptop to see people in the chat. But nothing I do is fancy. I don't use a fancy mic or editing software. I use a free app and a $25 microphone from Amazon. It works, and that's what's important. 

Setting up the schedule for the live stream was super stressful because I didn't understand it. I had to contact Youtube support for a few questions, but they were answered and I moved forward. 

The day of, I was incredibly nervous. Like, anxiety attack nervous. Literally shaking nervous. But I got everything set up and I was ready. I went onto Discord to announce the time and met with an amazing hype team. One guy, in particular, offered me technical support throughout the whole stream, which was a huge load off that I had someone to ask in case something went wrong. (afterward, he sent me a document of ideas and helpful websites. Just the greatest person) Everyone else encouraged me and pumped me up, and they were all there when I streamed. 

I started shakily, but I saw some familiar usernames in the chat which helped. Then we started talking about poetry, something I'm super passionate about, which loosened me up a lot. After that, it was just doing art and talking with people. 

It was wonderful. I loved every minute of it. Everyone was so nice and talkative and supportive. It didn't feel like a livestream, it felt like talking with a big group of friends. 

My phone decided to run out of battery, though, so I had to end earlier than I would have liked. That stressed me out more, but I ended the stream successfully and all was well. 

Though, afterward, I sat in bed and read for an hour to decompress. 😅 Just introvert things. 

All in all, it definitely took a toll on my emotions. But I totally want to do it again very soon. 😊