All Bets Are Off

This is about to be the most popping platform I have. That, or it’ll be another year of scattered posts where I try my best, and internally I feel dry and uninspired. Time will tell.

Everything can change in an instant. You can have a whole transformation of self in a day, a week, a month. I mean it (I’m not referring to the Age of Aquarius either, but I’m stoked to see what Pluto in Aquarius has to preview for us all). Before you go and roll your eyes at me, I don’t mean I’m about to change my whole ass self with a snap of my fingers. I’m just saying, it can happen with the right motivation and universal string-pulling.

A year ago, if you told me that someone who hated me would reach out with condolences, I’d laugh. If you told me my yard would be full of non-stop growing weeds, I’d say “please, no, I’m tired”. If you told me, last week that I would voluntarily join the capitalistic, corrupt work force again, I’d say “nah, I’ll sell my panties before doing that again.” (Still on the fence about that one *wink wink nudge nudge*)

Recently I elected to stop posting on Instagram and Twitter. At first, it was just going to be Facebook and Instagram, because of how strongly I felt about the Tiktok ban (if you follow me on IG, you already know). But then I got into this toxic thought pattern while still on Twitter. I started feeling insecure, foolish, and I was second-guessing myself again.

I wasted years of my life hiding the real me. I made progress during my divorce and I really didn’t think I’d get back into that mental time-suck. Yet there I was, talking to a very select few about my headspace, how social media warps my thinking, and how difficult it is for me – once again – to distinguish what’s real and what’s not. I don’t mean in the sense of hallucinating, that’s a scary beast in itself.

I truly believe we live in a fake world. Everything is plastic. The smiles, the intentions behind each handshake, the “you can tell me anything”s. It’s all plastic. People, more often than not, don’t really care about your story, because they’re going to edit it down while telling someone in the next room. Everything is just juicy gossip. I think most of us look at celebrities that way, but no one really took into consideration that you could be just as susceptible of faking your own life. Sharing just the good parts. Or just the bad parts (if we’re going with the celebrity comparison), and then being treated by friends or mutuals like you were just plastered all over tabloids.

From behind a screen, it really is difficult, because you don’t see everything in person. The good, the great, the bad, the devastating. You just see what people choose to share. I’ve never felt comfortable living like that. I’ve always been on one extreme or the other: silent, or oversharing. Meanwhile my overshares are being sent as screenshots in groupchats and picked apart. Removing social media and taking control of who has access to me seemed like the obvious decision.

So here I am. Building my own organic self, weeding out what doesn’t belong, trying my best to identify the pollutants from the genuine growth. It’s a process. C’est la via.

On a more personal note (because I might use this little place as a temporary diary to think-puke and be in a little more control of that whole “access to me” thing):

I think it’s really disappointing that our geriatric government is trying to put restrictions on social media. My tiktok FYP is predominantly homesteading, tinctures, stand-up comedians, indie bookish stuff, and occasionally the mentally ill making teehees. It’s been an educational platform more than anything for me.

I mean, I’m frickin’ learning how to grow an avocado tree from the pit. It won’t bear fruit, but it’s a nice start into being more green. What? You thought all that talk about growth was purely metaphorical? (I won’t post photos for awhile, so just imagine I’m giving you a silly little smile while you read this)

All right, friends. Thanks for sticking around and stay tuned for my next post which will likely be about my BMAC content – tonight I’m editing Chapter Five of Daughters of Sugar and Ash. But, like the title of this update, all bets are off. Who knows what’s in store for us an hour, a day, a week from now. We just gotta stick around to find out.