The irony of me posting this as a blogpost is not lost on me. But watching something this morning has made me think again about something that’s been swarming in the back of my head for a while now.
I don’t want to join the choir of hypocrites and say “Yes, she’s right” and then continue to painstakingly post the minutiae of my life online. I’ve been realising for a while, through an internal process, that, really, I need to curb it. It’s just so easy though and, even though there are now clearly delineated parts of my life I won’t share anymore, I still find myself shoving the innermost thoughts I have into some sort of 140 character rubbish I probably shouldn’t post anyway.
The thing is, for me, and I don’t know what it’s like for you, so I won’t assume or presume anything… is that, right now, life online makes me tired. I feel powerless to it, and I feel like I’m consumed by it, often. I don’t feel the need for affirmation that others may feel, as Essena outlined in her video, but I do feel a need to stay connected, and realising that said a lot more to me than I thought it would.
About halfway through this year, I committed to not logging on during certain weekends. I did this because I noticed that, the moment I sit down every day, I open three familiar tabs. And then, for the first few minutes of my day, I read. I catch up. I “connect”. Except, I don’t. Instead, I get sucked in to some maelstrom of other stuff I don’t really care about, and then I feel compelled to say something. Be intelligent. Or funny. Whatever. I’ve found myself wanting to not be here, but the truth is – I have to be. This is what I do, where I live and how I work. Hell, I make a living out of being online, although my career is not defined by my online persona. I can, however, thank my online life for my career. Does this make sense? It shouldn’t – I feel like I’m experiencing a contradiction in thought, just by writing it.
This is how I find new work, keep in touch with people I care about (and I do, actually, care about the people who live inside my screen) and figure out my life moving forward. But as I’ve slowly curbed the stuff I share online (there are some areas of my world I will never, ever share…right now being one of them, because we have stuff going on, but it will be fine), I’ve become more territorial about the things I do say or share online. And as I’ve taken more and more elements of myself offline, and mentally marked things that I will not let anyone in on, I feel like I’m reclaiming pieces of myself. Pieces that I gave away, freely. And a lot of the pieces of me I gave away, started from a place of personal pain.
The thing about pain is, there is a relief to sharing it. When I talk about something horrible that has been experienced by me, it always ends up two ways – one, where people roll their eyes and click “next” or the other, very sweet, “we’re here for you” approach. The thing that I have always found to be healing, is in sharing that pain. Heck, it’s how and why I began writing in the first place. But as I started leaving things out of my life online, I also stopped talking about the inner turmoil that I feel on many days. I started sharing less of what I really felt like, and honestly, right now, I feel like a complete failure at a bunch of stuff I am scared to confess to.
But I am also happy, so please don’t think the two can’t co-exist. In my real life – the one where I bake for my dog and oversee my kid’s homework or, you know, watch a movie with my boyfriend – I am exceedingly joyful. I have everything I could possibly have desired in my real life, and that includes the sometimes melancholy parts of me. It’s in that part of me, that I have always, and probably will always, find a muse. It is in the quiet self-confrontations that I am able to discover and pinpoint the things I want to say but can’t find the words in the jumble of a day.
I made a pact with myself that, this year, I would say goodbye to a lot of my pain. No, that I would bid farewell to sharing a lot of my pain publicly but that, in itself, is very much a farewell to it. I have my reasons for it, all of which are tied up in a bundle of wanting-to-acknowledge-a-journey-I’ve-been-on. And while I may still share a fear or two (I have many, constantly, every day), I also needed to focus on the fact that I have come a really long way. Longer than I expected, better than I thought. Not as good as the world often desires me to be, but I like this place. I like this place for me.
I am not the girl who would sit in front of her computer with a cigarette burning her hair, crying into her keyboard at 2am. Anymore. There were a million beginnings in that girl, but a thousand more endings that got her there. My inner pain… it had become a crutch for me. An excuse, even, to prevent me from moving forward in my own life.
In actively working to bid my personal pain adieu, I realised it was me who kept putting me through it, over and over again. That’s the thing though – life happens and pain occurs because of an experience. I’m not saying I’m immune to it now, but I am saying that I’ve learnt I can have some element of control over how I choose to express it. Realising that I choose, and not the circumstances I find myself in, was a revelation in its own right.
And that’s why I don’t blog as much anymore. That’s why I’m trying very hard to log off when I need to. And that’s why I’m not going to tell you about some things. And mostly, I’m never going to do it to get some likes.
Wow that article on that young Instagrammer – such powerful stuff! I hear you on all of the above. Being writers, it’s tough to distance ourselves completely and there’s so much I’ve gained from my online life too. Striking a balance isn’t easy but I’m joining you on your journey because REAL LIFE is the most important.
I get this 100%. Online makes me tired too. And yet, when I’m tired, that’s where I go.
Here’s what I think about social media: the novelty has worn off. And in some ways, people are filtering their posts less, and so we’re seeing the horrible side of humans more and more. I find it utterly draining.
It used to be fun; it more than often isn’t anymore. And yet, I’ve made such amazing friends.
So it’s just one big paradox that I’m struggling to find my way through.
That said it all. So so much X
Very thought provoking – I know how it is to live in happiness and yet with pain. the interesting part of my journeys has been my faith progression. I have had so many revelations just lately and in many ways things I had put on the backburner or had not even realised were problems have been made very clear during meditation or quiet time with my God. we are all different and yet we are all carrying pain – I wish we were not but with age realisations come, it is easier to forgive yourself for not being perfect but the part where you ache for family members or dear friends, that place where you want them to be ‘all right’ never seems to go away and maybe it shouldn’t as in my case it keeps me on my knees.
I love you, infinitely. I’m so grateful for you, in every single way. The thing is, we can’t avoid pain in life, because it’s part of the experience. Moving beyond and thriving beyond it what’s key. Thank you for this. Family is everything X
I knew you’d feel similarly – I’ve really, really battled this year to detach, but I’m working hard on it. Real life needs to be and stay first X