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Hi it's Emily from Bite Size Vegan and welcome
to a very atypical vegan nugget.

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I’ve been debating whether or not to make this video
for quite some time and kept pushing it back

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so that I could at least post one 
more solid educational video first.

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But I feel it’s come to a point where it’s necessary.

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I want to let you know a little bit about
what’s been happening in my life, what will

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be happening with the channel and why, as
well as tell you something about myself that

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I’ve never shared publicly.

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As those of you who’ve been watching my
channel awhile know, I’ve gone from releasing

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2-3 videos a week consistently for about two
years without fail—even down to the exact

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publishing time—to announcing that starting
August 2016, I would be reducing to one video

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most weeks, to the past few months wherein
I’ve posted hours or even days later than ever before.

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As I said within the announcement video I
published in July, the reduction in posting

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frequency wasn’t a vacation, but rather
a strategic—albeit painful—decision arising

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from the mounting unmanageability of an ever-increasing
workload and ever-decreasing sleep.

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Having long ago reached the point of being
unable to answer every comment, message and

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email—which I abhor more than I can possibly
explain, and wish so desperately I could reply

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fully to each and every one of you—recently
I’ve been increasingly more behind, overloaded

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and decidedly absent from social platforms.

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I greatly value accountability and have always
been someone who makes good on my word, even

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when the other party has no expectation. The
first time I was five minutes late posting

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a video, I thought I was going to have a heart
attack. But after having uploaded a few videos

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recently explaining and apologizing for why
a video was not ready, I’ve found that what

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I perceive as an unacceptable failure to keep
my word, is by and large not that big of a

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deal to those of you who have commented.

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Still, I’ve felt the need to try and explain
why I’ve been failing to keep up.

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One of the primary reasons I mentioned for
shifting to one video a week was to dedicate

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more time to building the necessary foundation
for a functioning team, upon which the long-term

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sustainability of Bite Size Vegan and expansion
of resources depends.

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Yet I’ve continually run into the Catch22
that in order to take on the help needed to

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realistically continue this work, I must put
in more time and more energy than ever before,

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at a point when my body and mind are refusing
to be pushed any further and I’ve literally

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run out of hours in the day, averaging 0-4
hours of sleep the last two plus years.

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Precisely because time is so limited, it’s
all the more vital I use it as wisely and

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effectively as possible. Part of this entails
re-evaluating the priorities and structure

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of Bite Size Vegan. Taking the time to move
forward with forethought will accomplish far

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more than maintaining a semblance of regular
video output while driving myself into the ground.

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Perhaps this will mean a shift in focus from
YouTube videos to speaking in Universities

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and schools, like the incredible opportunity
I had to speak in a New Jersey high school

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class recently, part of which you can see
in this video, which is also linked below.

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Regardless of the direction Bite Size Vegan 
takes from here, I cannot continue to do

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everything on my own all at once.

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I’m trying to fit too much in this video.
To stay somewhat focused but still offer more

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information for those interested, I published
an additional video in a public post on Patreon,

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which anyone can access, linked here and below.
It goes into more detail about team building,

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why I’ve not simply issued an 
open call for volunteers,

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how and why I started a Patreon page, and 
more about the financial end of things.

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In striving for transparency and accountability
regarding the requirements and demands of

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Bite Size Vegan’s expanding workload, I
feel I’ve yet to find a balance between

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making an excessively boring multi-hour tutorial
and another overly abbreviated task list,

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or indecipherable mess, which always fail
to convey anything comprehensive.

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But, that’s not even what this video is really about.

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Today I want to try and communicate 
something very important about who I am—

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though it has been infinitely more 
challenging to put into words.

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I’m Autistic.

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I’ve never shared this publicly and I want
to be clear that in talking about my experience,

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I am not and cannot speak for other Autistics;
nor is this video intended to be an in-depth

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educational overview of autism.

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For anyone unfamiliar, I highly recommend
referencing autistic activists and self-advocates,

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not Autism Speaks, which, like so many of
the organizations I’ve covered in my videos,

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harms and misrepresents the very individuals
for whom it purports to advocate.

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I’ve provided links to several resources
in the description below and on the blog post,

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including Autistic activist Lydia X. Z. Brown
of the blog Autistic Hoya, who effectively

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introduces autism as “a neurological, pervasive
developmental condition. It is a disability…not

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a disease [and] is a lifelong condition that
spans from infancy to adulthood. Autistic

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people usually share a variety of characteristics,
including significant differences in information

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processing, sensory processing, communication
abilities or styles, social skills, and learning

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styles.”

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Despite prevalent stereotypes, there aren’t
any visible markers for autism and no two

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Autistics are the same. An incredibly concise
yet surprisingly helpful analogy I’ve come

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across is that “autism is not a processing
error. It's a different operating system.”

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I’ve spent my whole life trying to understand
and operate in a world that seems completely

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foreign. I’m only now even barely beginning
to understand how I’m “wired,” so to

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speak, and slowly learning how to work WITH
instead of AGAINST my brain.

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Despite having worked with autistic individuals
and people with varying abilities for over

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a decade, and passionately vocal regarding
issues surrounding disabilities as well as

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mental health, I've had a huge blind spot
for myself, believing and being told my whole

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life that aspects of who I am were wrong or
bad—and that I just needed to try harder,

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do better, stop being so difficult, and for
the love of god, stop asking so many questions.

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There are two main reasons I’ve never shared
this about myself. First, I was only diagnosed

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just over a year ago haven’t really had
a spare moment to take the time to process

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everything, and second—as I’ve said many
times—Bite Size Vegan isn’t about me.

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There are a lot of things in my life that
I don’t include on the channel. Not because

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I’m ashamed or trying to hide anything—in
fact, I actually tend to grossly over-share

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by societal standards—but because that’s
not what Bite Size Vegan is for.

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I’m sharing this with you now for a few
reasons, the most pressing being that I’ve

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reached a point of what’s called “autistic
burnout.” I’ve linked here and below to

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a very helpful video on this topic by Autistic
blogger, public speaker, advocate, and activist

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Amythest Schaber. It’s part of their fantastic
video series “Ask An Autistic,” and really

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speak to where I am right now with a clarity
I can’t express at the moment. I mean it’s

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taken me over two weeks of writing, editing
and re-writing, to finish this video.

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Another reason I decided to try and communicate
my experiences in such a public manner was

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the hope that doing so might—even in the
smallest way—help break through the misinformation,

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disinformation, and stigmatizing of autism,
as well as let any of you out there facing

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similar challenges know that you are not bad.
And you are not broken.

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It’s okay to be yourself fully and find
what tools and help you need to be healthy.

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I for one have always had to reach a place
of extreme over-exertion to even consider

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dialing anything back. And with the animals
being my central focus every day the last

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few years as a full time activist, it’s
taken me pushing myself even further beyond

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exhaustion than ever before.

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But I have to start listening to what I’ve
said in to all of you in many videos: in order

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to help others, you must first help yourself.
If there is to be any hope for me to continue

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with the work I desperately want to keep doing
every minute of the day, I have to step back

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from certain aspects for the time being in
order to learn and put into place the necessary

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supports for myself.

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I’ve driven myself to a point where my ability
to be an effective advocate for the animals

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is progressively decreasing. Yet I keep stubbornly
forcing myself onward, when even so many of

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you have told me to please take time off.

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To be honest, time off, relaxation and 
self-care are very foreign to me.

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In fact, the one time in my life I really 
made a concentrated effort to relax,

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I ended up getting sick from 
the stress of trying to relax.

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I’m that good.

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My brain has never been a quite place.

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Even when I try, I can’t disconnect any single element from its myriad of connections and contexts.

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I seem to lack any inherent filter for prioritization,

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so essentially every new concept, variable, thought, change or sensory input adds to the existing chaos—

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everything all at once all the time.

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You can kind of hear this in my unscripted
Q&A’s, where I’ll take the scenic route

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to an answer, speaking somewhat rapidly in
an effort to keep up with my brain.

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Communication has always been demanding. The
challenge is navigating through the shifting

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chaos and deepening complexities while attempting
to harness them long enough to translate them

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into a linear, simplified progression of thought,
designed to help others make the connections

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for themselves.

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Throughout my life, my art, and my activism,
I've made decisions based on what would be

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most effective for the message or purpose
of my work, regardless of my own comfort.

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Almost every aspect of Bite Size Vegan involves
the very things in life I find most difficult—even

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terrifying: learning and utilizing technology,
using social media…at all…reaching out

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to people for interviews, asking people to
share my videos (or trying to even though

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they’re a free resource), asking for anything
from anyone in any capacity, dealing with

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unexpected change, dealing with expected change,
making business decisions, networking, traveling,

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structuring and organizing, anything regarding
schedules—especially when out of my control—navigating

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basic human interactions, and—most absurd
of all and the very purpose of Bite Size Vegan:

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simplifying complex issues into clear, linear,
easily-accessed and understood educational

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resources.

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But the truth is, if my mind didn’t work
the way it does, and I hadn’t been through

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what I have, I wouldn’t be the person I
am. As utterly exhausting and taxing it is

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to go through this process with the way my
mind operates, every comment or message of

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change from new and existing vegans makes
every ounce of effort more than worth it.

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Being autistic is not a tragedy. Looking back,
I believe it’s been an integral factor in

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my connecting with non-human animals from
such an early age. I’m far from the first

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autistic person to draw this connection. In
a perfect example of no two Autistics being

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the same, take Temple Grandin, the most well-known
autistic woman in the world. Dr. Grandin has

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written how autism allowed her to really put
herself in the place of the animals and understand

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how they think, what scares them, what makes
them feel safe. And she used that profound

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connection to design “better” and “friendlier”
ways to systematically murder them.

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I, on the other hand, arrived at a different
conclusion. From an early age, the experience

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of give everything I have in an effort to
communicate clearly or to ask for help, only

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to be dismissed, ignored, or misinterpreted,
made me all the more passionate about and

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determined to fight for the animals who are
also screaming at the top of their lungs but

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are not just denied their voices and their
freedom, but also their very individuality—living

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every moment in a hell infinitely worse than
I could ever imagine.

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I will never not be autistic. And wouldn’t
want to be if I could. As I’ve said many

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times in my videos, we need as many varied
and unique voices speaking about veganism

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as possible. You will reach people I never
could, just as I may reach people others have

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not.

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I’ve heard from so many of you that you
don’t feel qualified, smart, or well-spoken

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enough to get active, or don’t look how
you think you should. That’s a major reason

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I make sure to share what I perceive as my
total incompetence, and the fear I feel every

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step of the way. Because we all have a tendency
to compare our insides to other people’s

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outsides. I think if we could all see what
was going on behind the scenes in each other’s

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lives, we may find that the people we think
have it “all figured out” are—in a lot

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of ways—just as lost and scared as we are.
I for one intend to keep fighting through

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the fear, imperfect as ever, learning with
every fall, and wearing my scars with pride.

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Before wrapping up, I of course want to spell
out what all this means logistically for Bite

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Size Vegan and the channel right now?

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Well, I’m not going to drop off the face
of the earth and I’m still not going on

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vacation. Honestly, I’d likely go insane
were I to stop working entirely or even have

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a stereotypical “day off.”

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I still have upcoming speeches—two already
confirmed are VegMichigan and Cleveland Vegfest—as

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well as slaughterhouse vigil trips and volunteer
time at farmed animal sanctuaries, among other

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things.

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I will post any events open to the public
on the “About” page of BiteSizeVegan.com,

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where you can also sign up for my newsletter
to be informed of announcements and updates.

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Plus you get a free ebook to boot.

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I’ll also be focusing intently on building
the team structure and figuring out what changes

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and supports need to be in place for the long-term
maintenance and growth of Bite Size Vegan.

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Again, please see the video on Patreon linked
below for more details.

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There’s an insane amount of backlog to be
addressed on many fronts, not the least of

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which is the email inbox disaster. And of
course finally sleeping!

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At least for the time being, I will not be
posting regularly on YouTube, and will be

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far less present on social media in general,
though I will likely still post on Instagram,

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Facebook and Twitter, so feel free to follow
me on those if you like.

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Also, given YouTube’s ongoing shenanigans,
it’s always a good idea to click that bell

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and choose to enable notifications for the
channel, so you’ll know when I do happen

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to bust something out.

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As always, I’ll be the most present on Patreon
checking in with and running things by my

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Nugget Army family, without whom there’d
be no future to plan for Bite Size Vegan.

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Though this may seem like a retreat or surrender,
it is anything but. I’ll never stop fighting.

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And this is the time to do so from a place
of grounded strength, no longer a crumpled

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mass, bruised and broken and swinging at shadows
in blind desperation.

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I hope you will continue to learn about and
help promote veganism by perusing the 350+

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videos on my channel. Please share them far
and wide, in conversations with friends, families,

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on social media. Both my channel and website
have a search feature and I have an excessive

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amount of playlists grouped by topics and
themes. I bet there are some you’ve never

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seen before! …and some you never care to
see again.

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It would mean the world to me to know they
are still being utilized for spreading the

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truth through education. I cannot overemphasize
the power of sharing—its impact should never

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be discounted

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Last but by far not least, I want to say that my supporters are unbelievable. You have sustained me,

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made my life livable through the sleepless
nights of overworking my complicated mind.

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Thank you for standing by me.

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And thank you for accepting me as I am,
long before I could begin to start accepting myself.

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Now go live vegan, and I’ll see you soon.