Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jackie. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Jackie, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

I have always been involved in creative pursuits, from elementary school to adulthood. Some of my major pursuits were photography, writing, and music, but always as a hobby, something fun to do and a way to express myself. In many ways, I still approach this the same way, but with much more freedom, flexibility, and a strong resolve to keep improving. The moment I started blogging, I just KNEW, in my heart, that this is what I loved. Sharing the stories, writing up trip reports, giving tips and helpful plans to people through my blogs, was what I was already doing with friends and loved ones, but this allowed me to share it with more people, and people who could truly benefit from it. But really, the first time I made a video blog and posted it to YouTube, I simply knew. This was it. A culmination of so many of my other creative endeavors in one format that fit everything I loved!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Hi there! My name is Jackie and I run the Super Enthused YouTube channel and all the associated social media. This started for me as a blog sometime around or before 2015, but I decided to try my hand at making my blogs into video format and posted my first YouTube video in August of 2017 and immediately loved it. My original idea for Super Enthused was to share really fun and unique travel destinations in different way – with a focus on bringing the viewer along with me for the experience. I see my YouTube channel as a sort of DIY cable-access travel show, where I can share really fun, cool attractions, theme park updates, amusement parks, comic conventions, historic locations, themed dining and resorts and other, more niche (and maybe even nerdy) kinds of destinations with fellow enthusiasts. When I started my channel in 2017, there weren’t as many people covering these topics as there are now in 2022, but my goal and vision remain the same, to share these things with my own special lens, my own unique, fresh take as an enthusiast who truly loves to share not only the places and events, but bits of background information, history, fun facts, lesser known details and helpful tips for those who plan to visit – and just make it a fun, engaging experience for anyone watching, even if they may never visit these places themselves. I want the viewer to come along with me, as a friend who is just hanging out with me doing these things. The experiences are always authentic, there’s always some humor and silliness, it’s never perfect (or meant to be), but I do always put my whole heart into each video or project, to really try and give it my best, and hopefully improve with each video. You’ve got to have a sense of humor to put yourself out there, and doing this has broadened my world and allowed me to interact with people all over the world in ways I can’t imagine I ever would have. But more than that, it creates community as people can interact with each other in the comment sections and share stories, feedback, tips and more. I have always been a planner, an organizer, the one helping to research trips and plans, and this way I can use that passion and excitement I have for sharing these things with more people, and of course also hopefully make them smile and bring them some positivity for at least a few minutes a day.

: Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My goal from the beginning was twofold – one, I always felt a longing for a creative outlet, and in the past I always had at least one. Growing up, I was in arts programs in school, from music to painting and photography. Later, I played music in indie bands and even toured the country. After graduate school and starting full time work, I found myself in a place where I had so many enthusiasms, so many things I loved, but no one creative outlet for it. I went through a time of trying different things, I even tried crochet, but blogging turned out to be something that gave me so much joy so I ran with that for a while and then transitioned to video blogs. This has been such a blessing as a creative outlet, because not only do I get to be creative in putting together my little travel episodes, but also editing them and trying to put together a little mini song with pacing and rhythm of each video.

The second part of the goal is something I have always been so passionate about, and that’s spreading positivity and encouraging people to live enthusiastically. There are so many aspects of society that try to crush adults passions, playfulness and curiosity, that I want to encourage people that you can still have fun, be enthused, do the things you like, go the places you enjoy, etc., and we can all share in it and enjoy it together to some degree because of the internet!

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

I don’t know if I like to call myself an artist or creative, but I can answer this question in the sense of the most rewarding aspect of having this creative outlet where I get to express myself and share the things I love and it’s exactly that. Having a place where I can share the things I really enjoy, the things I would be doing even without a camera in my hand with genuine enthusiasm, to a community of people who share, or at least appreciate and are entertained by, my enthusiasm, has been so rewarding. As I stated earlier, I’ve always been a planner and loved putting together itineraries and sharing fun facts and lesser known details about any given place, so when I meet a family who tells me they tried a restaurant because of my video on it, or they knew to do a certain thing a certain way because of my video, and it helped to make their trip better, that is probably the biggest unexpected reward of all this. Some how, in some small way, if I can make someone’s trip that they saved up and planned for, better in even the smallest way, that is something really special. By the same token, if I can make someone smile for just a few minutes a day because they enjoyed a video I put together, help them plan their trip or even see a place they don’t necessarily plan to visit but are curious about, that is just so rewarding and brings me so much joy!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.superenthused.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/superenthused
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/superenthused
• Twitter: www.twitter.com/superenthused
• Youtube: www.YouTube.com/superenthused

Image Credits
Super Enthused