Embrace Your Inner Nerd - Nerdforge
Embracing who you truly are is difficult, but why?
In high school, many people hide the things they are passionate about out of fear of not fitting in. Most, unfortunately continue this into adulthood. Choosing careers that are, more socially acceptable or following the sports and hobbies of their friends. Just to feel they belong.
Some people though choose to embrace their inner nerd.
Like my guests Martine and Hansi from Nerdforge
In this episode Martine and Hansi share with us their origin story, Nerdforge comic book No.1
They talk about de-weaponizing the word nerd.
Embracing who you are and letting go of what others think
We get an insight into how they separate work and relationship
You’ll hear how they turn their nerdy ideas into reality
And we hear what the future could hold for nerdforge.
Martine and Hansi have grown their youtube channel pretty quickly using this philosophy of embracing your inner nerd. So some great lessons to be learnt
QUESTIONS:
1) Before we get started. Do you want to introduce yourselves, who is Nerdforge?
Today out topic is “Embracing your inner nerd”
I brought you guys on the show today because your journey so far seems to have embraced this philosophy. Like any journey its always good to hear the origin story. The comic book No.1
2) Now, In the beginning the channel was called Natural Nerd, Martine had a bit of a British accent, and you guys were making more practical projects such as Camera Rigs, Lighting, and even a desktop mini fridge. Which coincidentally is how I found you guys. I came across your mini fridge video. When I was researching how to cool my “voice-controlled sofa beer fridge”.
Where did it all start…. and at what point you decide to embrace your inner nerd and go all in on the fantasy genre?
3) Let’s talk about the word “Nerd” When I grew up in the late 80s early 90s, being labeled a nerd was a death sentence.
Being that you are self-proclaimed nerds, how do you feel about the N word?
4) Being nerdy, digging fantasy stuff, running a YouTube channel and discord server is probably difficult for those not into that stuff to understand
How do you guys deal with friends, family and people that just don’t get it?
5) Nerdforge is a fairly big operation now for the both of you.
How do you share the workload?
6) You guys live and work together. A death scenario for most couples.
How do you guys’ separate work and relationship? Are there any conflicts and if so, does Martine don her armor and whoop Hansi’s ass or do you deal with things in a more civilized manner?
7) Talking about armor. Martine, you said once that you wanted to wear your armor everywhere.
Have you embraced your inner nerd and gone shopping in one of your costumes?
8) Inspiration often comes from many places
Where do you guys often get your biggest and badest nerdy ideas and what’s your process look like, when making those ideas reality?
9) You are both working full time at Nerdforge and the channel and projects are growing.
Where do you see the future of Nerdforge? What’s the next big step?
I wanted leave you by saying….Being a nerd is awesome! It doesn’t matter if your interest isn’t ‘mainstream’ because we need more unique people in this world.
A quote from Simon Pegg explains this better than I could myself,
“Being a nerd is all about being honest about what you enjoy and not being afraid to demonstrate that affection. It means never having to play it cool about how much you like something. It’s basically a license to proudly emote on a somewhat childish level rather than behave like a supposed adult. Being a nerd is extremely liberating.”
Nerdforge Links:
https://www.youtube.com/c/Nerdforge
https://www.instagram.com/thenerdforge/
Justin White (Garage Avenger)
website: https://www.garageavenger.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/garageavenger/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVOyyAChQzN3HZSakwFn-3Q?view_as=subscriber
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/user?u=32422944&fan_landing=true