Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Martello.
Hi Michael, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
Hi! My name is Michael and when I was 27, I moved across the country from New York to California to find a new adventure after losing myself for many years.
As a kid, my childhood passion involved writing and making short videos. These hobbies were something I valued very much growing up, and I can always remember having an incredibly creative spirit. I would write my own short novels in my alone time, while also making videos with friends and editing them into short movies. As I grew older into the high school years and beyond, I lost these passions as life got in the way – i.e., trying to make it in the real world, finding a sustainable career path, and learning what it means to be an adult. The only problem was, no matter what job I had, promotions I received, I wasn’t ever happy!
Ever since I was 16 and drove the California coast for a vacation, I always knew I wanted to live here one day. It was the most beautiful place I had yet been to, and it actually shocked me how much more there was to life than my suburban New York hometown (and NYC). For the next 10+ years, however, I didn’t have the mental strength to actually make such a big change and move 3,000 miles away from everything I knew. Anxiety was always my biggest struggle, and I saw some of my darkest days in my early 20s. However, I made it my mission to one day reach a level where I could put my fears aside and live with purpose.
When I was 27, after living in New York City for several years, I finally built the energy and courage to move across the country and ended up in Los Angeles. Feeling nothing but pride and excitement for making the jump into a new life I never imagined would be possible for me, I wanted a way to document my new experiences, travels, and lifestyle. I picked up a camera again, started exploring new places in SoCal, and posted them to YouTube. While it took a year or so of filming, editing, and posting to really advance my filmmaking quality, it became an obsession of mine – not for the views, not for the subscribers, but for my own passion and self-fulfillment aside from my regular day job in advertising. I truly learned that when you have passion for something, you can’t possibly give up – because giving up would mean you didn’t really enjoy it in the first place. As a side note, I still do have my 9-5, but I’ve learned to value/appreciate it more as it being just a small part of my life (i.e., how I pay the bills), but no longer my entire life.
I started building a YouTube audience and a community of people who enjoyed my videos: those who found useful travel tips, entertainment value, and enjoyed my down-to-earth approach and personality (at least as I’ve been told by many!). I was able to monetize my YouTube channel after one year and have been enjoying a side-income hustle ever since, which of course, only motivated me further!
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
My biggest obstacle has always been (and still is) my anxiety. I know we all have anxiety from time to time, but mine especially manifested a lifestyle where it was challenging to leave bed, get my head straight, and live my life like an everyday individual. While this is something I still manage, and most likely always will, it has been significantly relieved by all of my travel adventures (often solo), passion projects (filmmaking, writing), meditation, and finding like-minded new friends. Also, my confidence in life has significantly increased.
It is also quite challenging to balance a passion project that requires a lot of time and effort against a full-time Mon-Fri career. While I film mostly on weekends and edit on weeknights, it does take away from my social life, and since I now consider YouTube as a second job: I feel like I am always working (the difference is: I LOVE this part-time job!). It’s been helpful to become more organized with planning and allowing myself to take more weekends off when I can.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I create YouTube videos about California living, travel guides, and motivational short films. I aim to create content that is more cinematic and is much more focused on storytelling than your simple travel guide listicle video. While it may look this way from the outside from its title and thumbnail, my content not only showcases travel tips, guides, and moving advice; it has always been deeper than that for me. It’s about the journey of life: of moving forward from adversity, and of finding your own adventure in a world we have such limited time in. My content often communicates messages about what it means to be alive, finding your passion, being spontaneous, and being true to yourself.
I have since created a few emotional short films that communicate the importance of these variables. In the future, I am hoping to continue with these films and evolve my content from California guides to videos that have deeper meaning: from overcoming adversity to spirituality. Because after all, this whole content-creation journey of showing off California has inspired me to get outside, explore my new home, learn how to become a successful filmmaker, meet incredible new people, understand myself more, and enjoy life to the fullest. And ever since I picked up a camera again, that is exactly what it has been like. I can truthfully say that I have never been more excited to be alive and create since moving here.
At the time of writing this article, I am enjoying a nomad lifestyle in beautiful San Diego, capturing content, and further advancing my adventurous spirit!
What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?
I see short-form becoming widely important for building and maintaining a business: something that can be a bit frustrating when your true passion is creating meaningful, more cinematic long-form style content. However, I think it should be looked at as a compliment to your videos, and another way of advertising yourself.
I also see the rise in content creators that make you feel better about yourself (and brands wanting to work with them more). I feel like I started my channel wanting to be like every other travel creator (“look how fun and exciting my life is!”), but have since been wanting to focus more on inspiring people to live a life of purpose and to get out and explore this beautiful planet we live on. “Influencers” who are too self-involved and egotistical will eventually fall.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: michaelmartello_
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@michaelmartello
