How to Rebel Against Modern Times
What would it look like to do something about all of our internet-related complaints?
In 2021, I quit social media. I’d gotten as sick of staring at my feeds as I had staring at the walls of my apartment. Aside our six foot spaced, CVS drive-through tested backyard symposiums, most social interaction existed through a screen. I was constantly confronted with things I didn’t ask to see against my will because I was held online against my will: vaccine conspiracies, rage bait born of boredom, gatherings that seemed to ignore that the rest of us were cooped up and isolated for the greater good (Close Friend feed, naturally). Worse, the internet suddenly became the main stage and our actual lives, a peek behind the curtain. Living life almost exclusively online had completely exhausted me. Not even the Italians singing on balconies could make up for it.
I stayed off for nearly a year, during which my accounts were permanently deleted.
It felt soothing to relinquish the impulse to capture moments for the purpose of showing someone else. It was liberating to stop berating myself for not trying to cultivate an online presence or a following, something it seems every creative career now requires as a prerequisite. Exchanging my life, even in glimpses, for a well-crafted personal narrative and a captive audience always felt more unnatural and flattening than empowering and fun to me. It was invigorating to not get activated by something trivial without my consent on an otherwise peaceful day. Suddenly there weren’t any compulsions to buy or to book or to “catch up to” on an existential level. I felt no fear of missing out or joy of staying in. I existed solely in my lane. I was simply neutral: present and minding my business.
But eventually, I felt disconnected from everyone, isolated even.
If you weren’t a daily group-text or phone call type of friend, suddenly it seemed impossible to reach out or know anything about your life. How odd is it, now, to text someone you platonically like, whose pictures you Like, with a sudden “hey what have you been up to?” It’s even weirder to call. Regardless of individual beliefs, in our Lord’s year 2024, that’s a social faux pas. Apparently, those low-stakes online interactions are integral.
With new friends, relationship choreography in a post social media world has inserted an additional courting period before even the lowest commitment coffee date: you check out the vibe of the grid, Like some things, respond to a Story or two (but not too many!). Now you’re warmed up and ready for that face-to-face. There’s content to discuss, literally and figuratively. You’ve studied, found common ground, and established a rhythm before ever having to make eye contact. In other words, you’ve softened the edges before taking the mortifying risk of being known. You can’t just go in IRL like you used to. Believe me. From 2021 - 2022, I tried.
In some ways, I felt like a mysterious sage living in a moss-fringed, off-grid cabin made of driftwood and superiority, feeding her chickens, developing a documentary about volcanoes, writing poems in an attic, stuff like that. Too self-possessed to ask questions on TikTok, too sophisticated for a meme, too grounded from all the meditation to be swallowed by the endless scroll. As far as everyone knew, I was too busy enjoying a thrilling career that demanded discretion and spending time with fascinating people in exotic locations to bother posting. I was throwing my head back and laughing like Vincent Price in “Thriller” on a boat en route to George Clooney’s Lake Como house while everyone else tugged at their displays for dopamine. In other words, it’s easy to get drunk on smugness under these conditions. Today’s iteration of “I don’t own a TV” is most certainly “I don’t have social media.” I’m sorry to those who deploy these words in order to sound interesting: they have the opposite effect.
I eventually created new Instagram and X (née Twitter) accounts and let out a sigh of relief. It wasn’t about showing off my life in a particular way or the follower count or the internal reward drug cabinet ignited by notifications. It was about having a casual little waiting room for everyone I maybe didn’t want to give my number to just yet, connecting with people I maybe wouldn’t cross paths with in real life, and being in on the conversation, even if that conversation included things like looksmaxxing, aura points and Andr*w T*te (God help us all).
That social media has had more of a negative impact than a positive one is well-documented and ubiquitous. We’re perpetually caught in a hell of our own making, knowing full well we’re the ones throwing gas on the fire.
Jia Tolentino writes in “The Hidden-Pregnancy Experiment”:
“[Social media promises connection as a salve for the loneliness created by social media].”
Beyond social media, there seems to be a collective fatigue for the state of how things are. Despite the unprecedented number of tools we have to live our best lives, we seem more miserable than ever. I don’t say this to be pessimistic; just look at the evidence.
First off, the vibes are deeply off. Have you posted to Instagram lately? Does not feel great! Secondly, between over 100 billion views on TikTok for #mentalhealth, self-help books nearly tripling since 2019 and the embrace of spirituality (Google searches for “manifesting” rose more than 600% in 2020), it seems we are all searching for something and not finding it. Some of the increases could be on account of normalizing stigmas but it’s difficult to ignore that social media put into our literal hands all the lives we’re not living, all the possibilities beyond the ones we used to see within our small analog worlds.
The Raising 90s Kids trend among mommy bloggers (ironically on TikTok), the nostalgia-reboot boom of any film or show pre-dating 2010, and the rise in dumb phones subtly point to an afflictive longing for “the good old days.” The ones, in short, without smart phones, even if smart phones are the reason we’ve mobilized against racism, witnessed war crimes that would otherwise be swept under the rug and plainly seen with our own eyes what happens to eco systems after years of environmental abuse (the polar bear videos alone!).
In short, I don’t think any of us actually want to go back to a life without smart phones or social media, even if the craving occasionally hits, convincing us that all our problems would be solved. I think we’re confused about how to exist within their context. Online is meant to aid in our reality, not be it. But we can’t seem to relegate it to the right place.
With this, I started thinking how boring it is, in general, to complain about the same things over and over. I’m tired of learning all the damage <insert internet-related issue> is doing without changing my own real-life behavior around it. Call it Eastern European stoicism, but it feels pointless lingering on these emotions1: apply logic, Comrade. Rather than feeling complacency for the sub-par lilts and sea changes of our present existence, what personal rebellions could I enact to take back my own? What does opposite of each online problem look like, at large?
At the risk of sounding glib, here’s what I came up with.
“Nobody Can Afford Anything; You Have to be An Influencer in Any Job”
I read an essay recently where a content creator-writer, in an effort to show transparency on the less glamorous side of her work, exclaimed “I even had to go back to a corporate job for a while!” As if this was the worst thing she could possibly imagine: a six figure salary, health insurance and air conditioning. In fairness, she was describing a long-haul grind that wasn’t coming to fruition and this was the tipping point when she had to potentially grieve her dream. Rough. But still. There are compromises to consider in an era where everyone wants a certain type of job and are told repeatedly, they should have it.
I get it. We all want to do work that lights us up. Agency, flexibility, and some level of purpose should, in theory, make up the gestalt of how we spend our one wild and precious life. I have no room to talk, considering much of my career has granted me those privileges. Yet this essay made me think of a quote from Mad Men that still haunts me. In an act of tough love, Megan Draper’s French mom (who if you close your eyes and ignore the accent is also Eastern European Mom) plainly tells her: “the world cannot support so many ballerinas.” She’s suggesting that maybe it’s time to give up on acting. It’s harsh. It makes Megan cry. It’s meant to.
The underlying message is not so much about the idea of limited slots for artists (although at face value, that’s the suggestion); it’s more, what do you really want? Because if it’s acting (in this case), it may never happen the way you imagined and you have to be ok with that. Are you willing to potentially give up an otherwise good life to keep trying? Do you really care about the craft or is it the idea of it that’s appealing? Many of those coveted spots often come at a massive, soul-crushing cost, one that will make you kind of miserable in the process if you don’t genuinely feel called to it every day, even with little to no success.
I wonder what the world would look like if people saw their jobs not as a catch-all for their passions, utilizing every drop of talent and potential, or vehicles to validate themselves by over-identifying with a prestigious title, but rather as tools that allow them to take the pressure off their art, making the experience of feeding their creative appetite more pleasurable and sincere.
In The Creative Act, Rick Rubin writes:
“If you’re looking for the work [your passion] to support you, you may be asking too much of it. We create in service to art, not for what we can get from art…It’s ok to have a job that supports your art habit…You can protect the art you make by choosing an occupation that gives you mental space to formulate and develop your creative vision of the world.”
In the context of the internet, maybe not everyone has to have a captive audience and a feature in a publication describing their morning routine and favorite matcha concoction. Not everyone needs to be interviewed about their journey to greatness or recorded speaking on a panel. Not everyone needs to be hosting Goop / Avaline / DÔEN Pinterest-perfect dinners (host one for Kamala instead :)). Not everyone’s job needs to be sexy and “important” to validate them as a human being. I’ve met very cool and sexy people with very “normal” jobs. They made the job interesting, not the other way around. Just watch any reality show - it’s all hot, charismatic 20-somethings who sell medical equipment! I know the constant announcement of accolades on Instagram will have you believing you also need one but it’s simply not the case. If more people aspire to “normal jobs,” those jobs will eventually become…aspirational. If we collectively stop attaching someone’s entire personality and value system to their work, the work might suddenly have more personality.
It’s weird and sort of dystopian to me that dentists now have to be “cool” and on TikTok in order for business to thrive. They’re dentists. Personally, I feel more comfortable if there’s no star quality whatsoever. Nobody needs to see a dentist doing the Apple dance before filling a cavity, unless of course, the spirit of Brat Summer compels. Then again, showing different sides to all types of careers seems like a net positive, another way to spotlight a job not always described as glamorous.
It’ll be interesting to see which careers Generation Alpha will pursue, following this Millennial and Gen Z impulse to be Great and 30 Under 30 and a little bit famous at all costs. Even the ones to your mental health, financial stability and sense of self.
“We Are All Addicted to Our Phones”
Me? I can’t wash dishes without a Podcast. I don’t leave my parking spot until I’ve fired up a new marg.mp3-recommended album. I have to read all my Substack newsletters and New Yorker Dailies like I’m Aaron Sorkin and it’s nigh time for an op-ed. The other day I was meditating…using my phone. Which is the reason I need meditation.
I don’t need to tell you all the ways this is brain-liquifying behavior. The dopamine reserves are unionizing.
Instead, I was thinking about how I could part with these addictions without doing something drastic and unsustainable (see: quitting social media): taking the risk of buying something without searching TikTok or The Strategist first, driving or walking without audio every other time, not immediately replying to texts / emails / DMs thereby taking back the space our phones have stolen.
Those are some of mine. Don’t do them! See, I think the mistake comes from giving one-size-fits-all tips like “try a time-limit app” or “buy an alarm clock” or “do a digital detox” without any consideration as to why and when we individually reach for our phones. Those three tips, for example, wouldn’t make a dent for me; they would just be annoying. Actual change requires self-examination, deciding what needs to be done and then practicing some restraint, which is also annoying but at least you’ll stop searching IMDB for Alfred Molina’s cameo history and watch the damn movie.
You will never suddenly tire of looking at your phone. The platforms that profit from our attention will only continue finding ways to make their algorithms more addictive. So ultimately, it’s having the desire to change (a strong personal why), customizing boundaries to your life and committing to them even when nobody else is watching.
“We Are in a Loneliness Epidemic”
Being in my 30s, I assumed that my social life had naturally just slowed down as a result of people having children, bigger career responsibilities, relocation out of major cities and so on.
It turns out, it’s not an age thing; it’s everyone. Gen Z is the loneliest generation.
In “Aren’t You Lonely?”
writes:When phone-based social media platforms emerged in the early 2010s they did not just take time away from real-life friendships. They redefined friendship for an entire generation. They gutted it. They removed the requirements of effort, of loyalty, even of meeting up, and replaced them with following each other back, exchanging a #likeforlike, and posing for selfies together.
I’d like to tell you about a time not so long ago when people left their houses. You didn’t have to book an appointment three weeks in advance. You didn’t have to look perfect, should there be photos taken, and be in a perfect state of mind, should your friend have to hear your problems. You wouldn’t have to cut the good time short because of a booked pilates class, militant morning ritual, or tightly scheduled day (that mind you, still allowed for 3-4 hours of scrolling). Podcast conversations didn’t replace real ones. “Catching up” didn’t take place over carefully crafted Instagram DMs and frictionless texts. Birthdays and milestone parties were sort of required if you loved the person, even if you didn’t really feel like it that day.
What if I told you this was 2019: a year with phones and social media. While the internet poses as an obvious foil to in-person interaction, I still don’t think it’s entirely to blame. We have free will. When I thought about how my own behaviors had changed from this time, I realized I’ve gotten lazy in the post pandemic fallout. I don’t attempt to make as many plans, I skip invitations more frequently, I don’t reach out nearly as much as I used to. I think in part because everyone had gotten lazy; it got tiresome being the only person making an effort, swimming upstream. But I came to understand the communal malaise as lockdown inertia and all of its comfortable routines, paired with our lives having already been incrementally more online each day. Habits are tough to break.
Doing the opposite of this will require effort. It means accepting invitations and actually showing up, being the one to set plans in motion, reaching out to old friends to catch up and putting yourself out there with new ones. We are so far away from this rhythm now that even reading it, it seems like labor. Why would I need to take the group text to a physical location? We’re doing great here. Everyone is very funny.
But what’s the alternative? Continuing to “work on ourselves” in isolation, depending less and less on each other and more on our devices, losing touch with someone for absolutely no reason?
The same goes with dating. I’ve never heard anyone say a positive thing about dating apps, yet nobody goes out anymore or talks to people they don’t know. Of course it’s frustrating that dating apps have changed the landscape even for those not using them but there’s still tremendous power in…leaving the house. When I moved to Stockholm, it was almost exclusively how I met people. I just went out. I struck up conversations. I got people’s numbers. I said yes more than I said no. Admittedly, Swedes are more welcoming than Americans (although, they’d humbly disagree) and maybe I am a little bit more extroverted than most (none of this was forced). Even so, not all my interactions went well. Some were disasters and that’s fine. I survived and had a laugh about it later. For every one person who was awful, I met ten who were wonderful and remain good friends.
There’s much left to be desired in the way the internet has impacted how we relate to each other and ourselves. Scrolling Instagram often feels more like looking at a series of business cards and human advertisements than the social experience it’s meant to be. I often wonder if I would’ve been better off never having deleted the app to begin with. Perhaps it was naïve to believe in a life entirely offline, that my personal protest would be more of a benefit than a hinderance. Or maybe it was an experiment whose outcome, along with all the little rebellions I’ve recently considered, has carried me to a different conclusion: the less online you are, the more of an effort you’ll have to make. Being online has made things easier but also created friction between the forces that profit from our attention and insecurities and our natural instincts toward creative fulfillment, presence and connection.
This moment in time, at once, feels powerful and fragile, online and offline in an endless arm wrestle deciding who gets to shape the future and what share each takes. I’d hate to see our complacency hand the steering wheel to a computer.
Nonetheless, one thing about the Slavs is we love to complain as much as French people…*lights cigarette*…*stares at nothing in particular with a devastating glare*
Spot on. You get it. It sounds simple yet it isn't. I tell someone make your own reality. I try my best to use it as a way to keep in touch. Like when you knew your friends phone numbers or write letters. Sometimes, not always, i try to disconnect for a part of the day. I make my own place. Read a book, think, watch a movie, whatever feels right for the moment. Like you wrote, I use the technology to assist me in reaching out, not be my world.
The words! You articulate our collective bewilderment and put into this writing perfectly. I'm glad i found this, instantly subscribed.