Seriously, I have been thinking about that since I read it. I think it is true that we are very dissociated but I wonder if it is really because of the internet or if it’s just part of being human and dealing with the fact we have to carry around our permeable, decaying meat sacks? Constantly doing processes I would rather not think about.From the moment we are born we are dying and that’s a lot, verdad que si? Okay, time for me to go back to high school where these “deep thoughts” were revelatory…
I think it is all of the above. My meat suit feels so cumbersome and there are days I am so tired of lugging it around, then I get to watch it morph into something weird as time passes like...hey, that did not used to hang that way...😭😂 It is also 5 day, 40-60 hour work weeks with minimal paid time off, no maternity leave for some, and and and... I could go on and on.
Still, I don't know that I even have it in me to write a whole essay on it because life is LIFE-ING, so please feel free to take the reins!!!! Someone should write it (not me -lol)!!
I love it when Sally blames Bethany for docking the tail that was already docked! That's the moment Sally gets a look in the mirror at her crazy ass self..in fact I hope Sally finds this piece and vomits on herself. This was great. I love when you take sabbaticals because we get to spend more quality time doing fun shit but then I miss reading your words. You're going to have to find a happy balance because I only get this part of you when you lock into the inter webs. I know others feel me on this.
Nodded along to every sentence of this and now my neck hurts 🤣🤣🤣
I’ve really been absorbing so much from you about how you value yourself and your time. How dutifully you try to make the most of every second. And I’m trying, really trying, to do the same 🥰✨🤍
I’m going to send you this INSANE thread about the AI bots on insta!!!
Sometimes I'm successful, other times...not so much. 🫠 Grace is my best friend. Giving it to others, to myself. The AI bots thread WAS full tilt blow my mind CRAAAASSSY. Still thinking about it calling Mark Zuckerberg a white supremacist then them swiftly taking it offline. loooooooolz
You may have just convinced me to take Instagram off my phone. I already took Facebook off a long time ago. But most of what’s in my IG feed are celebs or ads. LOTS of ads about makeup for women over 50 (she says, clinging to the last six months of 49 😩). It’s not real life, and this is before AI accounts.
Girl, same 😂 My ads are "Makeup for over 40! You're using the wrong thing" Not real life at all. I still have Insta on my phone but I have all notifications for it turned off. It has been a game changer. I mostly use it for DMs with my friends that are scattered throughout the country and even then, it is sporadic.
I had the notifications turned off too and I even hid its location on my phone but my monkey brain quickly learned the workarounds and I was truly addicted. I set a timer to kick me off after 45 minutes, but I’d override it almost every day. No bueno! So off it went. Thanks for the inspo I needed 🫶🏻
I thought I lost my phone last night on a flight and felt such an odd sense of relief. I found the damn thing at the bottom of my bag this afternoon and I've scrolled afternoon ... like I need to catch up on the internet. Gross. 🤢
We are all searching for balance with this and stumbling for answers but I have to believe that it's the intent that matters and sooner or later we can figure it out.
Petya, I have done the same thing 😭 (scroll to catch up). Searching for balance and stumbling for answers, exactly this! I feel there will be a mass logging off soon on the mainstream social media apps (Insta, TikTok-about to get banned, Threads, Twitter, etc.) because as each day passes, I read about others feeling the same way...overwhelmed and just over it all.
I can't wait to hear what you think about Middlemarch! Your reviews are always so refreshing and fascinating (If I never read a NYT review I won't be sad.)
I just want to purchase a phone that isn’t a handheld MacBook. Gimme calls, camera, and texts only. No internet. No apps.
Appreciate this read. I am about to delete IG myself and already did all other social platforms. There’s a big, beautiful world happening all around us, and we need to go experience it more without documenting it or missing it completely.
"There’s a big, beautiful world happening all around us, and we need to go experience it more without documenting it or missing it completely." 😮💨 🎯 Precisely!!!
Heather...my flabber was gasted. I don't know if you've seen the CNN article about how Meta scrambled to delete its own AI accounts after the backlash...one of the bots called Mark Z a white supremacist 😂 they were out here telling on him!!!!! It was WILD. Airing out all of Meta's dirty laundry.
I really wish there was a way we could subscribe to newsletters in the mail and receive hard copies. Then when we want to comment, I'd have to actually mail you back a response. This is admittedly a half-baked idea and I haven't solved for how to learn about new newsletters (like the old CD clubs of the past?) but someone has to figure this out.
Which is a long way of saying, I love your writing.
Thank you, Chris!! Wouldn't that be so nice and cozy? Slow it all the way down like 1882. Newsletters are where it's at for me. Long form, easy on the nervous system, glimpses into another's mind with thoughtful comments/discussions that follow. Bliss.
The AI generated users were the last straw for me. After wondering why I’m on the platform where it’s mostly reduced to lurking awareness. Before leaving Meta by deleting my accounts I did send happy new year messages, and the responses felt like shocking people out of a daze. Oh, hi! People are on this thing? Like we were all on autopilot sharing and closing the app, anyway. It makes me think about new ways to connect with each other outside of these platforms.
Don’t even get me started on the AI users. The fact that could even get greenlit says enough about Meta and how they think of humanity.
Lurking awareness!!! 🎯 You're exactly right with being on autopilot when we open and close those apps. So many people lose consciousness when they are scrolling for hours. I've been with some friends right after they had a scroll on the apps and talking to them directly afterwards was like speaking with someone who had just come out of a coma. It took them a while to come back to themselves. Which is so damn frightening. Makes me incredibly sad. Also CONGRATS on leaving Meta!!! I think that is wonderful.
Soul sabbatical!!! I need one of those!! - I don’t have social media in my phone and I like it that way. I wish I could let it go completely. Maybe Brian the AI relationship expert is my last straw.
Damn, those AI profiles are so disheartening!! I took two years off social media entirely while in graduate school a few years ago. I had so much more mental space (which I desperately needed for school) but it was quite freeing. Since coming back online, my habits are drastically different. Not as addicted to it (though of course I still get stuck in tiktok endless scrolls) but the desire to share my life and details of it has not come back. Recently thinking about how I can take even more of my life offline.
I love that for you! Two years sounds luxurious. Since I've started to take regular breaks from social media, I don't feel inclined to share as much as I used to and I love it. It does feel incredibly freeing. I feel far more present in my life than I did before. I've started to carry around books instead of my phone when I'm able. I'll put my phone at the very bottom of my tote when I'm out or leave it upstairs and take the book downstairs. It has done wonders for my reading life! ❤️🔥
So refreshing to read you Jenovia. I could almost feel your wild, refreshed, unconditioned synapses reaching over to me. I don’t know if it’s a particular quirk of my nervous system but I’ve never had an attention span for the scroll. It hurts my brain (and heart?)
It’s strange to call Substack social media and know I can only access it with phone or computer and yet feel how it connects me more, deepens thought, feeling, makes me feel more hopeful about humanity than any walk through downtown Portland could. I want to connection AND I want to keep my phone plugged into the wall for a better part of the day. But notes is another thing, you’re right. I choose to keep my notes time for quick shares of things I’ve read and the occasional moment.
But if I could snap my finger and make all this connection and depth and support and inspiration happen in the flesh, I’d be over the moon and never need this phone again.:)
And yes please write about this! I don’t get it, honestly, it scrambles my brain so hard!
“The one-minute video hits that have spread online like a plague, the ones people just can’t seem to get enough of, read as mass disassociation to me—which is a whole post on its own.
To sully that gorgeous mind of yours by scrolling would be the ultimate crime. I'm so glad you don't do it.
It is strange to call substack social media. The thoughtful slowness of it all makes me put it in a league of its own. I do love Notes, most of the time, probably because I don't use it regularly. I'll go through phases where I post a few things then disappear for a week. That cadence feels nice.
"But if I could snap my finger and make all this connection and depth and support and inspiration happen in the flesh, I’d be over the moon and never need this phone again.:)" I couldn't agree with you more!!!
My restaurant friend likens media to food. Spicy Doritos to Michelin starred. She says the real spark is the knowing the people who will never cook from the people who will always cook. Those who will never cook will be fed AI profiles the way I was fed WWF or Jerry Springer.
The scary part is actually when the water is diverted from the real farm to the fake farm.
Yes, yes, yes! I am right there with you Jenovia. We need these breaks! They are so damn refreshing.
Sometime in the middle of 2024 I took a 6 week break from all of it, and I felt a lot of the same stuff you expressed. The low-level anxiety of my phone nagging at me went away. I felt myself slowing down, which helped me not only notice but also savour more of those precious everyday moments. And as you said, a part of me also didn’t want to come back.
In fact, I found that time so refreshing that when I did come back, I decided to do a complete overhaul. I stopped using Instagram and Facebook, choosing instead to only use the two platforms where I share my creative work — Substack and YouTube (I share my skateboarding videos on YouTube). I also severely cut the number of people I subscribe to on substack, keeping only the people who I believe offer something of genuine value and substance.
Doing this has been super helpful for how I engage with my phone, but even still, I do feel the urge to go on another ‘soul sabbatical’ soon.
Also the AI shit gives me the creeps as well. Finally, while I’m glad you had a break, I’m also glad your back — I missed your perspective :)
I love that you did a complete overhaul!!! I think social media can be fun and beneficial if we use it with precise intention like you mentioned in your comment. Asking questions like: is this person adding value and substance to my life or is it causing me to numb out and leave my brain/body because I don't want to deal?
AI in this regard is so creepy and unnecessary. We are living in wild times. 🫠
Yes, I definitely agree. Like most things social media has it’s good and bad aspects and it’s all about how each of us choose to use it. What I find interesting is that, unlike so many other things — such as driving a car, drinking and drugs, or talking to strangers etc — no one ever taught us how to use this strange new thing, because no one knew. It was just thrust upon us and the wild times began haha :)
I have time limits on my phone. I only have access to my Instagram on Saturdays for only 30 minutes and Substack is 2 hours a day. I’ve also taken a straight 100 days off all socials. This helps me regenerate my brain rot
I am not discipline at all, lol. I am literally locked out. My husband is the only that knows my screen time passcode on my phone so I can’t give myself time to scroll when my limit expires. The only way I’ve been successful being off is literally having no access to it. I fear that that’s the only way for us to get off the social media hamster wheel - tools that bar us from entering cuz our brains have no self discipline
😭😂 I'm cryingggg. Thank you for your honesty...but the fact that you set up that roadblock inspires me still. You get all the flowers! It's exactly why I asked the question if anyone else has taken significant breaks from social media. I need something to aspire to 💥
I love this post so much...laughed and winced all at once. I am constantly considering deleting my IG (esp because I'm public with photos of my kids!) but back when I tried to sell my first book, my literary agent told me I was a "ghost" and nobody would buy a book without a sense of who I am. And of course, they are who I am. Still, I get the creeps, feeding the machine. I've been considering a phone sabbath--one day a week of just putting it on a shelf. For now, I have the luxury of having everybody who needs me right around me. So why not? I agree wholeheartedly with your broader point that, as artists, we must take care of what we put into the vessel. Our consciousness is our raw material & we dishonor it when we junk it up. Maybe this is an age old conflict for creatives--how much noise to tune into; how much to tune out. I do think we're at a tipping point with social media, though. Is it time to just hold our noses and leap to the other side....? I will if you will ❤️
Thank you, Isabel! ❤️🔥 The good ole' you need a following on social media blah blah from agents. I get it, and UGH. That phone sabbath sounds excellent! Turning off notifications on social apps has helped tremendously. That way, I can schedule time to use them instead of having them use me. I feel myself doing the little foot/booty shimmies that kitties do before they leap, so I'm getting there!!! 🫂😂
Pero like, don’t go away before you write that mass disassociation post.
😂 Ha! Adore you, Abra!
Seriously, I have been thinking about that since I read it. I think it is true that we are very dissociated but I wonder if it is really because of the internet or if it’s just part of being human and dealing with the fact we have to carry around our permeable, decaying meat sacks? Constantly doing processes I would rather not think about.From the moment we are born we are dying and that’s a lot, verdad que si? Okay, time for me to go back to high school where these “deep thoughts” were revelatory…
I think it is all of the above. My meat suit feels so cumbersome and there are days I am so tired of lugging it around, then I get to watch it morph into something weird as time passes like...hey, that did not used to hang that way...😭😂 It is also 5 day, 40-60 hour work weeks with minimal paid time off, no maternity leave for some, and and and... I could go on and on.
Still, I don't know that I even have it in me to write a whole essay on it because life is LIFE-ING, so please feel free to take the reins!!!! Someone should write it (not me -lol)!!
I love it when Sally blames Bethany for docking the tail that was already docked! That's the moment Sally gets a look in the mirror at her crazy ass self..in fact I hope Sally finds this piece and vomits on herself. This was great. I love when you take sabbaticals because we get to spend more quality time doing fun shit but then I miss reading your words. You're going to have to find a happy balance because I only get this part of you when you lock into the inter webs. I know others feel me on this.
Nodded along to every sentence of this and now my neck hurts 🤣🤣🤣
I’ve really been absorbing so much from you about how you value yourself and your time. How dutifully you try to make the most of every second. And I’m trying, really trying, to do the same 🥰✨🤍
I’m going to send you this INSANE thread about the AI bots on insta!!!
Sometimes I'm successful, other times...not so much. 🫠 Grace is my best friend. Giving it to others, to myself. The AI bots thread WAS full tilt blow my mind CRAAAASSSY. Still thinking about it calling Mark Zuckerberg a white supremacist then them swiftly taking it offline. loooooooolz
You may have just convinced me to take Instagram off my phone. I already took Facebook off a long time ago. But most of what’s in my IG feed are celebs or ads. LOTS of ads about makeup for women over 50 (she says, clinging to the last six months of 49 😩). It’s not real life, and this is before AI accounts.
Correction: you DID convince me. Took it off yesterday. I’ve been reading my book more. My book! Can you imagine?! (I know you can ☺️)
I AM SO PROUD OF YOU!!!! What are you reading?!
The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson. WWII Churchill requires ALL my focus, lol.
Girl, same 😂 My ads are "Makeup for over 40! You're using the wrong thing" Not real life at all. I still have Insta on my phone but I have all notifications for it turned off. It has been a game changer. I mostly use it for DMs with my friends that are scattered throughout the country and even then, it is sporadic.
I had the notifications turned off too and I even hid its location on my phone but my monkey brain quickly learned the workarounds and I was truly addicted. I set a timer to kick me off after 45 minutes, but I’d override it almost every day. No bueno! So off it went. Thanks for the inspo I needed 🫶🏻
I thought I lost my phone last night on a flight and felt such an odd sense of relief. I found the damn thing at the bottom of my bag this afternoon and I've scrolled afternoon ... like I need to catch up on the internet. Gross. 🤢
We are all searching for balance with this and stumbling for answers but I have to believe that it's the intent that matters and sooner or later we can figure it out.
I am reading Middlemarch later this year! 🤫🥰🥰
Petya, I have done the same thing 😭 (scroll to catch up). Searching for balance and stumbling for answers, exactly this! I feel there will be a mass logging off soon on the mainstream social media apps (Insta, TikTok-about to get banned, Threads, Twitter, etc.) because as each day passes, I read about others feeling the same way...overwhelmed and just over it all.
I can't wait to hear what you think about Middlemarch! Your reviews are always so refreshing and fascinating (If I never read a NYT review I won't be sad.)
I just want to purchase a phone that isn’t a handheld MacBook. Gimme calls, camera, and texts only. No internet. No apps.
Appreciate this read. I am about to delete IG myself and already did all other social platforms. There’s a big, beautiful world happening all around us, and we need to go experience it more without documenting it or missing it completely.
"There’s a big, beautiful world happening all around us, and we need to go experience it more without documenting it or missing it completely." 😮💨 🎯 Precisely!!!
Also, the AI users is just too much. What. The. Heck. Are. We. Doing. Anymore?!?
Being “influenced” by a stranger online has always felt cringe. Knowing they may not even be human… just feels violating.
Heather...my flabber was gasted. I don't know if you've seen the CNN article about how Meta scrambled to delete its own AI accounts after the backlash...one of the bots called Mark Z a white supremacist 😂 they were out here telling on him!!!!! It was WILD. Airing out all of Meta's dirty laundry.
I really wish there was a way we could subscribe to newsletters in the mail and receive hard copies. Then when we want to comment, I'd have to actually mail you back a response. This is admittedly a half-baked idea and I haven't solved for how to learn about new newsletters (like the old CD clubs of the past?) but someone has to figure this out.
Which is a long way of saying, I love your writing.
Thank you, Chris!! Wouldn't that be so nice and cozy? Slow it all the way down like 1882. Newsletters are where it's at for me. Long form, easy on the nervous system, glimpses into another's mind with thoughtful comments/discussions that follow. Bliss.
Would yours be handwritten or typed? And typed on a computer or typewriter?
Handwritten always!
The AI generated users were the last straw for me. After wondering why I’m on the platform where it’s mostly reduced to lurking awareness. Before leaving Meta by deleting my accounts I did send happy new year messages, and the responses felt like shocking people out of a daze. Oh, hi! People are on this thing? Like we were all on autopilot sharing and closing the app, anyway. It makes me think about new ways to connect with each other outside of these platforms.
Don’t even get me started on the AI users. The fact that could even get greenlit says enough about Meta and how they think of humanity.
Lurking awareness!!! 🎯 You're exactly right with being on autopilot when we open and close those apps. So many people lose consciousness when they are scrolling for hours. I've been with some friends right after they had a scroll on the apps and talking to them directly afterwards was like speaking with someone who had just come out of a coma. It took them a while to come back to themselves. Which is so damn frightening. Makes me incredibly sad. Also CONGRATS on leaving Meta!!! I think that is wonderful.
Soul sabbatical!!! I need one of those!! - I don’t have social media in my phone and I like it that way. I wish I could let it go completely. Maybe Brian the AI relationship expert is my last straw.
No social media on your phone 😍 Sara, YOU ARE GOALS!!!!
Damn, those AI profiles are so disheartening!! I took two years off social media entirely while in graduate school a few years ago. I had so much more mental space (which I desperately needed for school) but it was quite freeing. Since coming back online, my habits are drastically different. Not as addicted to it (though of course I still get stuck in tiktok endless scrolls) but the desire to share my life and details of it has not come back. Recently thinking about how I can take even more of my life offline.
I love that for you! Two years sounds luxurious. Since I've started to take regular breaks from social media, I don't feel inclined to share as much as I used to and I love it. It does feel incredibly freeing. I feel far more present in my life than I did before. I've started to carry around books instead of my phone when I'm able. I'll put my phone at the very bottom of my tote when I'm out or leave it upstairs and take the book downstairs. It has done wonders for my reading life! ❤️🔥
So refreshing to read you Jenovia. I could almost feel your wild, refreshed, unconditioned synapses reaching over to me. I don’t know if it’s a particular quirk of my nervous system but I’ve never had an attention span for the scroll. It hurts my brain (and heart?)
It’s strange to call Substack social media and know I can only access it with phone or computer and yet feel how it connects me more, deepens thought, feeling, makes me feel more hopeful about humanity than any walk through downtown Portland could. I want to connection AND I want to keep my phone plugged into the wall for a better part of the day. But notes is another thing, you’re right. I choose to keep my notes time for quick shares of things I’ve read and the occasional moment.
But if I could snap my finger and make all this connection and depth and support and inspiration happen in the flesh, I’d be over the moon and never need this phone again.:)
And yes please write about this! I don’t get it, honestly, it scrambles my brain so hard!
“The one-minute video hits that have spread online like a plague, the ones people just can’t seem to get enough of, read as mass disassociation to me—which is a whole post on its own.
To sully that gorgeous mind of yours by scrolling would be the ultimate crime. I'm so glad you don't do it.
It is strange to call substack social media. The thoughtful slowness of it all makes me put it in a league of its own. I do love Notes, most of the time, probably because I don't use it regularly. I'll go through phases where I post a few things then disappear for a week. That cadence feels nice.
"But if I could snap my finger and make all this connection and depth and support and inspiration happen in the flesh, I’d be over the moon and never need this phone again.:)" I couldn't agree with you more!!!
My restaurant friend likens media to food. Spicy Doritos to Michelin starred. She says the real spark is the knowing the people who will never cook from the people who will always cook. Those who will never cook will be fed AI profiles the way I was fed WWF or Jerry Springer.
The scary part is actually when the water is diverted from the real farm to the fake farm.
I love that analogy! Scary indeed 😭
Yes, yes, yes! I am right there with you Jenovia. We need these breaks! They are so damn refreshing.
Sometime in the middle of 2024 I took a 6 week break from all of it, and I felt a lot of the same stuff you expressed. The low-level anxiety of my phone nagging at me went away. I felt myself slowing down, which helped me not only notice but also savour more of those precious everyday moments. And as you said, a part of me also didn’t want to come back.
In fact, I found that time so refreshing that when I did come back, I decided to do a complete overhaul. I stopped using Instagram and Facebook, choosing instead to only use the two platforms where I share my creative work — Substack and YouTube (I share my skateboarding videos on YouTube). I also severely cut the number of people I subscribe to on substack, keeping only the people who I believe offer something of genuine value and substance.
Doing this has been super helpful for how I engage with my phone, but even still, I do feel the urge to go on another ‘soul sabbatical’ soon.
Also the AI shit gives me the creeps as well. Finally, while I’m glad you had a break, I’m also glad your back — I missed your perspective :)
I love that you did a complete overhaul!!! I think social media can be fun and beneficial if we use it with precise intention like you mentioned in your comment. Asking questions like: is this person adding value and substance to my life or is it causing me to numb out and leave my brain/body because I don't want to deal?
AI in this regard is so creepy and unnecessary. We are living in wild times. 🫠
I'm so glad to be back too!! Thank you, Michael 💥
Yes, I definitely agree. Like most things social media has it’s good and bad aspects and it’s all about how each of us choose to use it. What I find interesting is that, unlike so many other things — such as driving a car, drinking and drugs, or talking to strangers etc — no one ever taught us how to use this strange new thing, because no one knew. It was just thrust upon us and the wild times began haha :)
ALL OF THAT 💥
I have time limits on my phone. I only have access to my Instagram on Saturdays for only 30 minutes and Substack is 2 hours a day. I’ve also taken a straight 100 days off all socials. This helps me regenerate my brain rot
That is so damn inspiring 😍 Janet, I am working towards having this kind of self-discipline!!!
I am not discipline at all, lol. I am literally locked out. My husband is the only that knows my screen time passcode on my phone so I can’t give myself time to scroll when my limit expires. The only way I’ve been successful being off is literally having no access to it. I fear that that’s the only way for us to get off the social media hamster wheel - tools that bar us from entering cuz our brains have no self discipline
😭😂 I'm cryingggg. Thank you for your honesty...but the fact that you set up that roadblock inspires me still. You get all the flowers! It's exactly why I asked the question if anyone else has taken significant breaks from social media. I need something to aspire to 💥
😂😂 I have no will! Thank you.
I love this post so much...laughed and winced all at once. I am constantly considering deleting my IG (esp because I'm public with photos of my kids!) but back when I tried to sell my first book, my literary agent told me I was a "ghost" and nobody would buy a book without a sense of who I am. And of course, they are who I am. Still, I get the creeps, feeding the machine. I've been considering a phone sabbath--one day a week of just putting it on a shelf. For now, I have the luxury of having everybody who needs me right around me. So why not? I agree wholeheartedly with your broader point that, as artists, we must take care of what we put into the vessel. Our consciousness is our raw material & we dishonor it when we junk it up. Maybe this is an age old conflict for creatives--how much noise to tune into; how much to tune out. I do think we're at a tipping point with social media, though. Is it time to just hold our noses and leap to the other side....? I will if you will ❤️
Thank you, Isabel! ❤️🔥 The good ole' you need a following on social media blah blah from agents. I get it, and UGH. That phone sabbath sounds excellent! Turning off notifications on social apps has helped tremendously. That way, I can schedule time to use them instead of having them use me. I feel myself doing the little foot/booty shimmies that kitties do before they leap, so I'm getting there!!! 🫂😂