Wait, Sare Liz has stuff on YouTube? What? Whatwhat?

Why? We though Sare was a writer.

Yep. Sare is a writer. She’s also a creative mad genius, too. So that means writing novels, poetry, spiritual guides, guided meditations, and other various things – and that’s just in the work sphere. She’s creative at home, too, but you don’t really need to know about her carpentry, knitting, sewing, or furniture arranging projects. And way back when (think, when Buffy still thought Spike was a bad guy), she used to have fun with her friends making videos using two tape decks. Technology has moved on since then and, finally, so has she.

What kind of videos?

Right now, there are four (FOUR! count them, four!) series up on Sare’s YouTube channel. The Updates + Spoilers series, the Guided Meditations series, and the Way of Love series are the first three. She’s also recently started putting her sermons online. When Sare has a bit more time, there may be other series – for instance, one on Kon Mari and Spirituality, and one in which she theologically reflects on popular tv and movies. But not right now.

A quick link to the different playlists (where you can easily access all the videos of a series) is right here.

Updates + Spoilers

The name says it all? Okay, maybe not. The updates refer largely to updates on what is going on with content on Sare’s YouTube Channel, as well as changes and announcements about publishing and writing, but also possibly life as it affects those things.

The spoilers refer to what I’m currently writing, which at present, is really all about the series Loki of Midgard, the rough draft of which is publicly available for free on Archive of our Own. (Oo, look! A perspective shift to first person. Let’s run with it.)

Guided Meditations

I love to meditate, I find it incredibly helpful in all aspects of my life, and I would be, frankly, lost without it. I do believe everyone could benefit from being able to meditate regularly, and I heartily support people beginning a meditation practice. But I also understand that not everyone finds it so easy to engage in meditation on their own, in fact several of my close friends have been very explicit about this difficulty.

In addition to this, guided meditations are helpful when a person is overwhelmed by an emotion they don’t want to have, and yet can’t seem to extract themselves from the hole in which they find themselves. This category also includes me, and in these moments, it’s usually my husband who guides my meditation and brings me back to sanity. Likewise, I do this for him.

Finally, and also the real reason I actually rebooted my YouTube channel, I got more than one comment from a reader and reviewer of Loki of Midgard when in a particular scene Loki guided Dr. Foster through a meditation to calm her mind before her first ride on the bifrost. The comments tended toward, “I just led myself through this meditation, and I want someone/Loki/anyone/you to lead me through this meditation again.” And I thought… I could do that.

So I did. And now I’m updating weekly. Yep, a new guided meditation every week, which isn’t to say you can’t go back and rewatch/remeditate through the ones that speak to you particularly well.

Religiosity note: The guided meditations are spiritual, but not religious.

Way of Love

I did not come up with the concept of the Way of Love, and it’s seven-fold parts that one rotates through in order to have a full and rich life, specifically, turn, learn, pray, worship, bless, go, rest. That would be the head of The Episcopal Church, a very fabulous guy named Michael Curry, and really, he just put what most religions have figured out into a spiffy, mostly rememberable cadence. But he also said to all us Episcopalians, go and make resources for everyone to use.

So, I am making short videos (each one ranges between one to four minutes long) with calming scenic views (I have fun taking hikes with my husband and filming those – it’s one more excuse to get outside), and yours truly doing a voice over of a spiritual nugget to help you through the day. Updated once a day, I cycle through the seven parts of the Way of Love, starting on Monday with turn and ending on Sunday with rest.

Religiosity note: The Way of Love is spiritual, and slightly religious. The learn videos are my interpretations of stories from the bible, which may include me dropping the f-bomb. The pray videos are in fact a prayer or two, and sometimes involving exorcism. The rest videos have no words at all. The other four videos contain original poetry that is spiritual but not religious. 

But the ads on YouTube are annoying.

Yes, I know. There are two reasons for having the videos on YouTube, despite the ads. The first is that YouTube is a larger platform than other ad-less ones I could use, and thus the videos are more widely available to people looking for something like them, beyond just my own circle of influence, who will eventually all know I’m rebooting my YouTube channel, because I’ll be telling them repeatedly.

The second reason for having the videos on YouTube, is actually because the ads create revenue for more than just Google, the owner of YouTube. If I manage to get more than 1,000 subscribers to my channel, I can sign up to receive 55% of the ad revenue Google would be making from my videos and the people who watch them. Depending on how popular the videos are, this might mean coffee money, or it might mean I could actually pay off my student debt and save for retirement. Or possibly even that I might not have to have several jobs, but rather focus on my writing and this digital content creation.

So that’s that. If you have more questions, feel free to drop me a line. I’ll be here.