My Cup of Tea: Your 1 minute video on how 7 Cups has helped you

@michaelmichael is leading a new series of listener support videos. It reminds me of a project that @rin put together quite a while ago titled My Cup of Tea. The idea was to ask people to make 1 minute videos about how 7 cups has helped them. You can think of these as videos that capture your 7 cups story or maybe a testimony of how 7 Cups helped you overcome some challenges you faced.

I, too, regularly use 7 cups to overcome challenges. I'm always a guest. It has helped me out tremendously. There have been many challenging nights for me where the kind and caring words of listeners have given me hope and new perspective. I was going to create a video as a sort of model to kick this off, but I realized that that might be a bad idea. Instead, I think it'd be good to have a community discussion about how we should structure these.

Here are some initial thoughts:

1. Only share what you are comfortable sharing. These would be uploaded on YouTube. Details are less important. The overall theme is much more important.

2. You can have the video be of you talking if you are comfortable; however, there is zero pressure from us that it be of you talking. You can also just make it a nature scene or some other image if you like in order to protect your identity.

3. These should be no longer than a minute.

4. A helpful framework might be:

Part I - intro to who you are - like 3-4 sentences so the person viewing gets an idea of who you are. Mine might be - I'm Glen, the founder of 7 cups, married with 4 kids, psychologist and tech entrepreneur.

Part II - Brief Description of the Challenge or Issue - again just like 10-15 seconds about the nature of the issue. In my instance it'd be something that would include points like this:
-Startups are brutally hard because there are a lot of moving parts. There are also a ton of unknowns because most of the time you are doing something that has never been done before. People who worry tend to better, because there is an awful lot to worry about as you try to navigate new waters. Doubt, uncertainty, and fear are par for the course. There were many nights when we had a particularly stubborn issue, or where I felt a lot of pressure from others or myself, where I felt overwhelmed. I couldn't really get perspective on my own

Part III - How 7 Cups Helped - 15-20 seconds about how 7 cups helped you. I'd focus here on what exactly happened - was it a listener, multiple listeners, was it the exercises, was it group support, all of the above? For me, it'd be like this:
-When I was feeling overwhelmed like this, I'd simply click on "connect to a listener now" and chat with a listener. I'd share how I feel like I have this impossibly complex puzzle to solve and how I feel like I'm running out of time. I'd share how I felt this constant huge pressure that would never leave me. Sometimes I'd cry. The listeners simply cared for me, they encouraged me, they listened to me. They helped me find new hope. I'd start the conversation at a 3 on a scale of 1-10 and end it 15 minutes later at an 8. I did this many many times over the course of the last couple of years. Now, I practice mindfulness with our mindfulness group and still chat with listeners and do exercises to keep myself moving forward.

Part IV - Thank you - 10 seconds where you just thank 7 Cups for helping you out. Again you should only do these videos if you feel like 7 cups has genuinely helped you and you are actually really thankful. For me, I'd say something like:
-I want to close with just saying a very big thank you to 7 cups. You were there for me on numerous nights. You had my back. You cared for me. Picked me up and dusted me off. Gave me courage to keep moving ahead. Thank you! I can say for certainty that I wouldn't be where I am without your support.

Let's discuss how to do this here and then also post videos here. Share any tips or recommendations. e.g., it might be helpful to write out a script first and it'll probably take a few times to get it right. Please add other thoughts, concerns etc. Thanks!