Get Your Beautiful Ass OFF Social Media.

(Self) Love Notes: Vol 5

I remember the day I learned how to put glitter words on my MySpace profile.

I was sitting in my office alone (I worked for Chippendales then) and playing around when I figured it out. I was REALLY excited that my profile sparkled AND played music when you visited it; it was 2004 which means (shudder) there’s a good chance that the song that played was “London Bridge” by Fergie.

Social media made me feel alive. It was exciting.

In 2007 I found myself on Facebook for the first time. It was an opportunity for me to connect with my college roommates and share innocuous status updates. Years later, in 2010, I was working in plus size fashion. It was then that I heard the word “influencer” for the first time. Back then, Influencers were people who got onto a social platform before it exploded and dominated a certain niche. They took good pictures. They made you excited about things – like jeans and dresses – and there was an air of innocence to everything. Their audiences grew fast, very fast, because Instagram was chronological than and the platforms weren’t flooded with competition.

I can’t remember when social media as a whole, started to change but it happened. For me, personally, I know my feelings about social media rounded a corner in 2019, when I realized I no longer had it in me to perform in the way that was required of me in order to maintain growing online.

Because, let me tell you, no matter what any creator says, it’s a social media is a JOB and, if you are putting your follower growth first, no matter what you are inevitably exchanging a little piece of yourself in the process. And if you DON’T put your follower growth first (unless you have the sheer luck of going viral) you can’t use your social media as a business tool.

I do remember when I (finally) learned that spending time scrolling on social media made me feel like shit. Cute pet accounts not included, I started to notice that the same tool that was designed to make me feel CLOSE to other people was actually making me feel farther and farther away from myself.

Maybe it’s because I knew the truth about so many of the wildly popular bloggers? I knew, online they showed AMAZING pictures with glamorous and perfectly placed lifestyle but, in their personal lives, so many of them were legit vile human beings who dabbled with serious self-loathing and hid behind the camera to make themselves look, and feel, more important than they actually were.

It started to eat at me. The façade. The lack of depth. At the time, I was learning just how co-dependent I’d been in my life and, unfollowing popular accounts became an act of self-love for me.

In 2020, when Covid changed our world, we were forced to become intimate in our own lives. For me, that was the final straw. My values were formed. My priorities were clear. And Sarah, as I know her now, really started to unfurl.

I needed real. I needed depth. Anything less was not interesting to me in life. If that meant living “smaller” than I was fine with that.

I craved connection and I was not interested in allowing social media into my life that wasn’t actually based on just that.

The other day I saw this article that shot straight to my heart. In it, it discussed this idea of “one sided intimacy” that many people develop with those they follow online. A person follows a celebrity or influencer online and they become attached and invested in this person… but there is no actual way for this person to return the emotion. In truth, that celeb or influencer probably has no idea this person even exists --- and they may grant them the gift if their “friendship” by talking to people Live or making custom content for Patreon levels – you know, things that make people think they are actually making friends with someone when, in truth, it’s a totally vacuous relationship.

Parasocial relationships. That what they are called. And what studies are showing is that parasocial relationships, and the platforms that were initially designed to bring people together, are actually making us more unhappy than we’ve been before. They reference a specific influencer who has been using Patreon to advance her career. “This is framed as a personal relationship, not an economic exchange. You support the creator because that’s just what friends do, and the creator responds in the language of friendship — by answering your questions, saying your name on the stream, sending you postcards, letting you pat them on their head.”

UGH.

I understand that some of this is ironic coming from me. I, myself, have spent years trying to find a niche for myself online. I’ve tried membership groups, I’ve tried mentoring groups, I even created a custom app for myself. At the end of the day, none of it has stuck with me but ONE thing.

One thing.

Connecting with people for real.
I still remember the faces of the people who signed up for my first ever mentoring group in 2017.
I recall what it felt like to hug people who came to my first event in LA the same year.
And in 2018…
And in 2019.

If you have joined me for a mentoring group (we use video) or a live event, we have connected to each other and SHARED ourselves for real.

We’ve crossed the barrier from parasocial to truly social. And, even if we didn’t get a ton of time to talk one on one --- I know something real about you, and you know something real about me.

And that, to me, is fucking magic.

Running events is hard. This email is NOT about that and it’s not a sales tool for my next Vatreat in the Dominican Republic in 2022. (FYI, it’s basically sold out but I have THREE spots left. Just saying.)

What this is an email about is a heartfelt plea from me to you --- TO GET YOUR BEAUTIFUL ASS OFF OF SOCIAL MEDIA AND TO CONNECT IN A REAL WAY.

Please do it.

I beg of you. Social media can be fun, I know. But it isn’t depth. Depth isn’t popular online, I know. LOL. The more deep and real I have gotten in the last few years, the more followers dribble away. And yet those that STAY are invested. Their hearts are open.

Fuck, I wish I knew you better. Really.

I wish we could sit across a room and look at each other in the eye.

I wish we could hug, if you were a hugger. If not, I’d give you a “high five” for expressing your boundaries and we’d laugh.

What I share online is my attempt at bringing depth to the social conversation. It’s messy. It’s imperfect. It sure as hell isn’t popular – but it’s a reflection of my values as a woman.

It’s also a tool. Because it helps me bring people together in ACTUAL real life.

Every now and then, a small fraction of you feel the call in your heart to be in a space I create for us.
And you show up.
You open your heart. You let YOURSELF shine through.
And when you do? It’s so epic.
Because real life is vulnerable. And the purpose of life is connection.
Not bullshit “likes” on social media. But HUMAN connection. Humanity.

This is my passion. This is my calling.

To connect.

And so I leave you with the following thoughts, if you even get this far.

Thought One: Influencers are not your friends. It’s their job to make you feel like you are friends so they can “influence” you into doing something. This doesn’t mean they are BAD people, but just remember in that specific trade, performed intimacy is a commodity.

Though Two: The Fashion Nova you see people wear in photographs on social media will, literally, never look the same on you. You have no idea the amount of pins and clamps people use to get that cheap crap to stay in place and look good. Also, Fashion Nova doesn’t offer refunds. Ever. So the best you can get is store credit for more crap that doesn’t look as as good as you want it to. I’ve been there. #BrokenDreams

Maybe I’m a cynic. Or maybe I’m just a person who wants to give and receive love with whatever time she has left on this planet in whatever way she can.

I’m going for the later.