How To Quit a YouTube Channel
We decided to quit Hilah Cooking after seven years. Here’s what I’ve learned about burnout, growth, and the natural cycles of creative work.
This is part of a series of extended posts updating my no-longer-available YouTube Book. For the first installment, click here. Here’s an index to the series in chronological order.
After seven years and hundreds of episodes, we decided to quit Hilah Cooking.
Hilah Cooking had been a life-changing success. This little project that we started as something fun to do on weekends had turned into a successful. It had given us the opportunity to quit our day jobs, travel the world, meet amazing people, and attend some incredible events.
And then, after seven years and hundreds of episodes, we decided to quit.
People still ask me about it. Why did we quit when it was going so well?
The answer is simple: burnout.
We started Hilah Cooking as two friends having fun making something new together. Over those seven years, we became a couple, got married, adopted two dogs, created a real human child, and moved to California. Our lives had changed. And so had we.
The creative spark that had driven us at the beginning just wasn’t there anymore. We were both getting restless and running out of ideas for more videos about food. Hilah was losing her drive to be a “stand-and-stir” cooking star. She was also tired of thinking about YouTube metrics and analytics.
I was spending more and more time on Yoga With Adriene, which was suddenly growing fast and consuming most of my time and energy.
It wasn’t a sudden decision—more like a slow realization. I can’t remember the exact moment when we said “let’s stop.” But we’d been talking about it for at least a year. We knew it was time. We didn’t have the energy and enthusiasm we would need to keep it going. When we finally made the decision to let it go, it was like a weight had been lifted.
It felt like an ending, but it was also a beginning.
7-Year Cycles
I’ve seen a pattern over and over with creators that I’ve gotten to know. I’ve noticed that many creators and businesses hit a wall right around the seven-year mark.
This isn’t just anecdotal. The idea of seven-year cycles pops up in all sorts of places:
Rudolf Steiner wrote about human development in seven-year phases, each one bringing new challenges and growth.
In traditional Chinese Medicine, seven-year cycles are tied to the essence (Jing) - a life force or vital energy that determines growth and health. At each 7 year interval there is a change in the body’s energy. (Technically it uses 8-year cycles for men, but that’s close enough for the purpose of this post.)
Astrology uses Saturn cycles made up of 7 year phases.
And we’ve all heard about “The Seven Year Itch” as it pertains to relationships. The idea is that at the seven year mark there is a natural restlessness and craving for change.
Once I became aware of these seven year cycles, I started seeing them everywhere. They’ve shaped the way I view the world.
When you’re building something new, the first years are fueled by excitement, creativity, and figuring-things-out. If you’re still going by year seven, a lot of the novelty is gone and things you used to love have become a routine. You’ve built systems. You’re on a schedule. You may have even hired people to help with some of the work.
This is often when burnout hits. At the very least, a desire to do something different starts to emerge.
For creators, I think this is the moment where you either reinvent or let go.
Push Through or Pivot
For us, it meant letting go of Hilah Cooking. Our creative energy was restless and we need to point it somewhere else.
An unexpected upside is that now - almost seven years since we “quit,” the channel and website still generate meaningful revenue. That’s the power of evergreen content. We’ve even made and published a few videos since then, just for fun - and to see how many of our old friends are still out there.
Burnout isn’t failure.
It’s a signal.
You’ve outgrown the old version of your project.
You’ve changed.
Your work has to change too.
We didn’t start Hilah Cooking to build a huge business. We started it to create something fun. Something that would hopefully let us live on our own terms. I also wanted to see if it was possible.
It achieved all of those things and we had an awesome time doing it.
To put it into perspective: how many traditional shows last for over seven years? It still feels like a huge success and major accomplishment.
But we finally listened to the signal and moved on.
Zero regrets.
PS: Have you ever felt burnout? Or are you feeling it right now? How did you navigate it? Hit reply and let me know—I’d love to hear your story.
I started my youtube channel in 2006 and experienced a few times I felt a little burned out, however I simply took a small vacation, came back recharged then kept going. I still enjoy the creative process however I've scaled back from 3 videos/week to 1 video/week and repurpose my long form videos into multiple shorts, blog posts and medium articles. ChatGPT makes it easy and saves a ton of time.
I can understand Hilah and you moving on. I worked at the same career for multiples of 7 years (more than 4), but the repetition finally was enough. As for your former format space, I still am enamored of YouTube cooking shows, but they come and go. Even the PBS shows evolve, changing formats or exploring odd corners of their once traditional cuisines. At home, I’ve kept it fresh by substituting ingredients and merging recipes from different sources (NY Times, etc.).
Of course, for selfish reasons, I wish Johnson & Sharpe, Inc., had stayed in Austin, but California is a truly beckoning location. All the best to your fam & you, Chris. Keep up the great work!