On being online.
I am what you would call extremely online, which feels super embarrassing to admit or even say. But, it’s what I am.
I’ve spent much of my life online. I’m almost 30 and have been scrolling various social media platforms since age 12 or 13. I put a lot of myself online whether it’s tweeting out every thought I have or posting pictures of everywhere I go. I enjoy being online but also I really fucking hate it.
Over the years, I’ve tried hard to break my online addiction. I’ve deleted apps only to redownload them again days or even hours later. I’ve tried gray scaling my phone so the colors are less addicting. I’ve tried turning off my phone for long periods of time to get away from it all. But, every time I go back. Whenever I do delete, I feel good for a few minutes and then crave the little dopamine hits I get every time a tweet is favorited or a picture is liked. I can’t stay away. In those moments where I’m away from my phone, I think I’ll reach some sort of clarity. That my brain will clear up and I’ll just be more in touch with the world. In all honesty, all I ever feel is bored. Do you ever realize how much time there is in a day? It’s a lot! And when you’re not mindlessly scrolling online, you have to keep yourself occupied. I don’t know how people do it. I read books and get bored. I watch TV but need something to do with my hands or else I’ll feel restless. I’ll need to communicate with someone about something. I just need to.
I’ve made so many friends online, ones that have stayed with me for years. It’s hard to pull away from that. Or to do away with all my social media knowing that it was pretty foundational to who I am and who I surround myself with. It’s allowed me to find spaces or people who are similar to me. Who understand me. I’ve learned a lot being online. I constantly read articles or see what people have to say. But, lately, it just feels like that’s no longer the case. Every time I am online, I just hate the experience so much.
Social media is performative. That’s nothing new to anyone here. We all do it to some extent. We create these versions of ourselves to put out there for everyone to see. We craft those images. We say what they would say. We post what they would post. We do this all to be liked by others. We do this to seem more than what we are. The reverse of that is that people think they know you. They follow you online so they think they know every aspect of you. They know where you tend to eat and what you tend to wear. What jokes you make or what your personality is. It creates this parasocial relationship to people. You just keep up with them. For years at a time. People you may not even care about but you’re reminded time and time again that they exist. You build these images of who they are based on what they post and they stay with you in your mind. But, do you really need to know all that? Can your life move on without knowing anything about where these people are or what they do? Probably.
Another terrible aspect of being online is the bad faith arguments people tend to make. It’s been like this for years now. One person says something and a thousand people jump down their throats to tell them how they’re wrong or how they haven’t considered XY and Z. Don’t get me wrong. There are always some things people should reconsider or rethink or not share with an audience. But, it just creates this weird atmosphere where anything you post online, whether it’s personal or not, becomes a thing or becomes a debate or becomes a take. On top of that, a thousand more people make ironic postings that amount to: look at this fuck wad and what he has to say. They post about others to get their likes and feel better about themselves. I’ve done it. You’ve done it. It can’t be helped sometimes. But, it’s not productive or good! As a side note, memes have become boring. I’ve been thinking this for a while now, but there are just no more good memes! They’ve all been done. Everyone races to make the same exact joke in the same exact format over and over. Every meme is now a groundhog’s day post. I’m just so tired of it. Like, what are we even doing here?
I don’t know how to go about cutting myself off from all of it. It feels so central to being alive in this century. But, I know I need to. Being online is depressing! Every day I’m reminded that the future is pretty bleak. That things don’t really change much. That our systems and societies are falling apart. Sorry! But it’s true. Don’t even get me started on the body dysmorphia I deal with being gay and Online or the sheer FOMO of constantly seeing people doing things and feeling an internal pressure to do things yourself. Everyone’s always doing something and posting about it and looking happy so I should do the same thing and post about it and be happy. Reader, I rarely am.
I want to live more privately. Not in a recluse kind of way. But in a way where I don’t feel like people are misinterpreting me or misunderstanding me or keeping tabs on my life from a distance. I don’t want that. I want to live my life on my own accord. I want to live more deliberately without care for what people think or say or if I’m doing what everyone else is doing. I want to protect my energy and my sense of self. I want to spend time on hobbies I enjoy. I want to spend more time reading or writing or working out. Doing things that matter to me. I just have a hard time getting there. I make strides and then I fall back. It feels like an actual addiction. I think it will require a bit of discipline and keeping myself preoccupied with things to do and little tasks to complete. However hard that may be.
I know this is all ironic coming from a newsletter where I write my personal thoughts and send them out to several hundred people. But, for the time being, it feels like the only outlet that allows me the space to put to words all that’s floating around in my brain. I need to drain them out and put them here. I need some way to express, even as jumbled as this all was, how I feel about being online and the feelings it creates for me as I scroll endlessly across social media platforms. Maybe I’ll start journaling. But then how will I get that dopamine hit if no one reads it?