“When Life Hands You Lemons…”

What makes you happy? What makes you feel fulfilled? What makes your life feel meaningful?

I started my journey to becoming an influencer in January 2021 with the following goals: post inspirational and relatable moments, gain thousands of followers, and make some money. Maybe even add — turn the hobby into a second career or even travel and connect with other influencers. (“Influencers in social media are people who have built a reputation for their knowledge and expertise on a specific topic. They make regular posts about that topic on their preferred social media channels and generate large followings of enthusiastic, engaged people who pay close attention to their views. Brands love social media influencers because they can create trends and encourage their followers to buy products they promote.”) I had this image in my head of what all of that would look like. I dreamt many times of what all of that would feel like. The validation. The acceptance. The praise. The money. The uplifting of others. The sprinkling of joy. The positive impact on others’ lives that I haven’t even met. But don’t you know that once I finally gained 300 more followers on Instagram over 6 months, and made my first 100 bucks from a post, THAT was the moment I felt overwhelmed?!

THAT was the moment I realized this isn’t for me. Now that doesn’t mean I can’t and won’t post on Instagram (“IG”), interact with people I don’t know, and still use hashtags. But what that does mean is that I made the choice to start something new, and listened to my heart and mind when they told me that this new thing wasn’t meant for me. This new thing wasn’t meant to be done in that way and still be a part of my purpose. What that also means is that I will now have a different mindset and goal whenever I’m on or using IG and other forms of social media. For a short moment, I felt like a failure because only 6 months have passed. Only 6 months into this new endeavor and I was already chucking up my deuces.

But after that short moment was over, I felt more confident in my identity and extremely proud of myself.

Proud of myself for listening to my feelings. Listening to my feelings and placing them first. Placing them first and acting accordingly. My feelings were telling me that this was beginning to consume my life. Every “free” moment I had, I used to either mentally or physically prepare to post on social media. “What photo(s) will I post?” “What caption goes best with that photo?” “What message am I trying to send with this post?” “What day/time is most optimal to post and get the most likes/engagement?” It was legit a full-time, part-time job. And I didn’t even realize it at first! Social media is a huge part of today’s society — we sometimes don’t even need resumes or “real” interviews anymore, we can get hired based on what’s on our profiles. We can meet our future spouses. Marginalized communities find safe spaces and acceptance. Funny videos can make us laugh after a rough and stressful day at work. Recipes are no longer found in a cookbook. Workouts are just one click away. Food-, home decor-, hair-, workout-, travel-, etc.- inspo is right at your fingertips.

“Inspo.” That’s what I needed to be careful of. Still do most likely. There is a very fine line between “inspo” and “comparison” for me. And probably for many others. Inspo (short for inspiration) can very easily turn into “I can’t afford to buy all those extra pillows for my bed.” “I don’t have the time to capture every moment on camera.” “What filter are they using to edit their photos?” “How come they get so many likes and comments on their posts?” The mental wheels would keep turning and turning and turning and now that I think about it, I don’t even think I ever had a smile on my face when I was prepared to hit “Share” on an IG post. Wow! I literally just thought about that. I read so many posts and articles on “how to become an influencer” and the gist of the advice were to post a lot, be consistent, engage with others immediately before and after you post, learn which hashtags to use, and know the best time to post. OMG. Just typing that sounded exhausting. Huge thank you to me for trying this thing out and putting it back on the shelf right when I realized it wasn’t for me!

I felt that overwhelming feeling begin to grow about 3 weeks ago. At the time, I had already made the choice to take a month off of work, but when that overwhelming feeling was ever-present, I knew this month off from work was definitely needed! Life can come at us FAST. You can start doing 2 things and it easily turns into 20 things and you don’t even realize it. That was the general reason why I wanted to take time off work. And one of my 2021 Resolutions was to have one weekend a month free of all social media. I chose the first weekend of July and wanted to start Friday July 2nd. When that Monday was approaching, however, I knew I wasn’t in a mental space to return to social media or check any notifications. So I told myself I wasn’t going to use social media again until I could answer these 2 questions:

Where does social media fit into my life, and why do I feel the need to be on it?

Today, I still do not have concrete answers to those questions, and I feel the past 3 weeks weren’t long enough for me to feel mentally strong enough to return. I have a feeling that once July is over, I will get on to check my notifications and return any messages that deserve responses. At that time I will evaluate whether I want to post anything to explain my “absence.” Whether I want to say anything about being “gone” at all. Whether I want to share my decision to just post for me and not for others. And I will decide how I want to navigate my social media and my personal profiles. Some of you might not even have Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter. And some days I feel like I want to just delete them all! But then some days I appreciate how easy those platforms make connecting to loved ones near and far.

We all know life is a journey. This just so happens to be a part of my journey. I’m not mad at it! I’m accepting of it! I don’t know if any of you have struggled with something similar — either related to social media or to something else that the world makes us feel is “necessary” to have. I knew I had some kind of discomfort with it, and then when I read the book An Ordinary Age: Finding Your Way in A World That Expects Exceptional by Rainesford Stauffer (AWESOME book by the way, and huge thanks to my good friend Will McIntosh for gifting me this book for my 31st birthday!), it was able to bring everything full-circle. I was able to relate to the author and the young adults she interviewed and quoted throughout the book. I found myself agreeing with their descriptions and points of view. It was a well-written book and I highly recommend it to every young adult who has ever felt any form of pressure from our society that demands a lot, and even to everyone in general, regardless of age.

As I was writing this blog post, I briefly explained to my mom what An Ordinary Age was about and why it resonated so much with me. I shared with her how I have a strong desire to just be me, do what I want to do and whoever loves it loves it, and whoever doesn’t, doesn’t. Her response was: “that is a good place to be and a hard place to learn where to be.” Isn’t she awesome?!

“Buried beneath the comparisons and FOMO, social media can be a means of showing yourself and others who you are, and feeling it echo back. It seems like a worthy opportunity to evaluate who you’re following, what you’re seeing, and how it makes you feel. That’s what demands to be noticed.”

An Ordinary Age, Chapter 7, pg. 157.

I now know the “influencer lifestyle” is not for me. And that’s okay. I also know that I TRULY enjoy writing my weekly blog posts and recording my weekly Monday Motivational Messages on my YouTube channel. As you already know, you can expect a new blog post every Thursday (super appreciative of all of you!), but you can also find a one-minute motivational message on my YouTube channel every Monday. I don’t feel this heavy sense of “obligation” when a new week rolls around and I need to prepare to publish my motivational message and blog post. I actually DO smile when I write or have an idea for a blog post/video that I jot down in my Notes on my phone. And once I get the idea on paper, organize the post, and add those photos??? Man! I feel so accomplished! So proud of my work! And so happy! This week’s Monday Motivational Message is very fitting to this blog post topic, too. It’s on what to do when we feel overwhelmed (fun fact, I recorded that video before I even got the idea for this blog post). If you’re interested, you can check that video out here.

What makes you happy? What makes you feel fulfilled? What makes your life feel meaningful?

“Behold, I will bring to it health and healing, and I will heal them and reveal to them the abundance of prosperity and security.” — Jeremiah 33:6, ESV.

Moni Jay, Off the Record