“It’s always the struggles that define you in life. Look back at your life whether you’re 13 years old or 80 years old and it’s always the hardest times that made you who you are.”

Casey Neistat

This week marks the return of my friend Casey Neistat to the podcast.

Where to even begin…

As a filmmaker credentialed with co-creating an HBO series and laurels from prestigious outlets like Cannes, Sundance and the Independent Spirit Awards, one would expect an artist of his pedigree to be directing feature films, documentaries and television shows for mainstream media. And yet sometime around 2010, Casey opted for the road less travelled, putting the traditional filmmaker path in his rearview to blaze a different and quite surprising path more in alignment with his DIY sensibilities:

YouTube.

The great irony is that in embracing the most democratic of platforms as his primary artistic outlet, Casey has indeed become one of the most compelling and culturally relevant voices of his generation.

From his sensational  “Make It Count”  (my fave) to his poignant  “What Would You Do with $25,000?”  to his gleeful  “Snowboard NYC”,  Casey has logged over 129 million YouTube views, compelling Wired Magazine to remark,  “Casey Neistat’s bite-size Internet movies have so much viral potential they make influenza jealous.”  Let’s not even get into his continent-sized following on Snapchat (check out his ancillary  Snap Stories YouTube Channel ), or the fact that he recently began posting a daily vlog so stellar, suddenly every other vlogger looks remedial. 

Putting out a volume of content that would rival a major network, Casey Neistat is truly a do-it-yourself triumph — famed and fêted for unceasingly documenting his life, globe-trotting adventures and myriad curiosities with boundless perspicacity and bootstrapping panache.

So what is it exactly that makes Casey’s work so irresistible? Maybe it’s simply because he knows how to tell insanely great personal stories. Perhaps it’s his rapier-like knack for tapping the zeitgeist pulse. His fidelity to authenticity. Or his expertise when it comes to connecting emotionally with a signature style that always leaves you yearning for more.

If you ask me what sets Casey apart, it’s something else entirely:

an absolute disregard for failure.

That, and a profound work ethic. He makes it look easy, but make no mistake: Casey Neistat works way harder than you do.

No, you can’t have his life. But you can have your own. To echo Casey, if you are doing it like everyone else, you’re doing it wrong. So stop following the heard.

Define your own path.

It was a treat to once again drop in on his singular Lower Manhattan studio —  “one of the most compulsively organized, ridiculously customized, and mind-bogglingly gear-saturated spaces on Planet Awesome”  — and I am pumped to share this conversation with one of the most interesting, creative, prolific — and in my opinion important — visual artists working today.