Casey Neistat is a man of many hats; he’s a former HBO star, filmmaker, famous Youtuber, world traveler, business owner, husband and father. He also happens to be my idol.
I stumbled across Casey Neistat two years ago during one of my late-night Youtube binges, when I serendipitously clicked on one of his videos titled "Make it Count."
In the video, Nike gave Neistat a budget to create a commercial about what it meant to “#makeitcount” in order to promote a new Nike product. So naturally, Neistat decided to take the money and travel the world.
The four-minute video consisted of Neistat traveling to exotic locations, such as Egypt, Italy, France and South Africa, in ten days, while simultaneously displaying inspirational quotes by iconic historical figures such as Albert Einstein and Abraham Lincoln. From the spontaneity of the video to the creative cuts and visuals Neistat used for the commercial, I thought to myself, “Neistat is a pretty cool guy.” And I’ve been following him every since.
Today, Neistat can be seen filming national commercials, shooting daily vlogs, making viral Youtube videos and working on his own social media app called Beme.
What is Neistat’s key to success? Personally, I believe it’s his seemingly endless amounts of creative energy. Neistat pushes himself artistically through the daily content he uploads to Youtube, using his unique way of telling stories to inspire millions around the world. I mean, who else films themselves cruising through Manhattan on a boosted board, shooting with a DSLR mounted on top of a Gorilla Pod?
In fact, Neistat’s way of telling stories has inspired me to share the stories of others, though my passion for photography and journalism. Whether it’s photographing some of my overseas adventures or deciding to share the stories of those in my community by writing for my hometown paper, storytelling has become my passion.
Neistat’s hard work has also undoubtedly led to the fulfillment of his own American Dream; he’s come a long way since dropping out of high school at age 17 and living in a trailer park in Connecticut with his girlfriend and their baby.
After hustling for so many years in the Big Apple, Neistat’s notorious for becoming anxious on vacations for not getting back to his New York City loft to continue working. Watching someone work so hard to make their dreams a reality has instilled a new sense of drive in myself to pursue my own goals.
In addition to his creativity and strong work ethic, Neistat has also inspired me to become passionate about traveling. Neistat has a severe case of the travel bug, and is often seen jetting to places as diverse as Turkey and Thailand. However, instead of taking short vacations just to “get work done,” Neistat makes a conscious effort to interact with the locals of the places he visits and be more than “just a tourist.”
In fact, in one of my favorite videos of Neistat’s, he traveled to the Philippines to assist in the relief for Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest tropical cyclones ever recorded. Neisat, like in the Nike video, was given a budget of $25,000 from 20th Century Fox in 2013 to promote The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, under the concept of “living your dreams.” Neistat thought, what better way to spend every penny of the budget than helping people in need? Just when you thought Neistat couldn’t get any cooler.
Several people have asked me what I’ve learned from Casey Neistat. One of the most important lessons I’ve learned from Neistat is quite frankly how to give Zero F*cks What People Think. In his video, titled just that, Neistat talks about picking between two paths in life: doing your own thing and standing out or doing what you are supposed to do and fitting in with societal norms.
“These judgmental people, their opinions don’t matter because they don’t matter. Judgmental people are of a lower moral authority of those than who don’t judge. And we, people who don’t judge, we have a responsibility to crush, to destroy those mean, judgmental bullies, and we do with an overwhelming positivity and we do that with an extreme open mindedness,” Neistat said in his video. “And when you subscribe to those values, you really stop caring what other people think. Because chances are, when other people are judging you, they’re wrong."
And Neistat demonstrates this attitude every day. Whether he decides during a blizzard to snowboard through the streets of New York City, followed by a team of drones or use his connections with Mercedes-Benz to travel on yachts in France for his son Owen’s 18 birthday, Casey Neistat does pretty much anything he wants―and never holds back.
Most of all, I’ve adopted Neistat’s philosophy of “Making it Count"; he has encouraged me to write more, take risks during photo shoots, see the world and constantly push my own creative envelope.
Whether you are looking for inspiration to get out of bed in the morning or just feel like watching some crazy cool drone footage, I encourage you to look up Neistat on Youtube―you will not be disappointed.
