If they don't like my post, they don't like me (and other lies we tell ourselves).

What happens when our lives and selves become "content"?

I hate the algorithm.

Over the last few years, I’ve come to know her (her being the algorithm, of course) quite well, as someone who writes, performs, and makes YouTube videos – all of which call me to promote myself on the dreaded social media.

In modifying our work for the sake of palatability and more universal approval, granted to us or withheld from us at the hands of the algorithm, we often sacrifice our authentic creative voice. And that’s fine; sometimes it has to happen. I worry about seeming contrarian or pretentious, like “I’m a young person trying to enter the creative workforce and I’m not following the rules because I don’t wanna!”

(Imagine I’m smoking a cigarette when I say this, and at the end of my soliloquy I kick a garbage can nearby. It’s all very moving.)

But what about when we are the content we’re sharing? What about when the “work” we’re modifying in hopes of hitting the algorithmic jackpot is us? We’ll get there in a moment, don’t worry.

Back on the subject of creative and intellectual pursuits — Formulas exist for a reason, and it’s rare that someone rises to success from rejecting those formulas. So I’m not saying that making edits to your work that feel inauthentic or following a more rigid formula for your art is always a bad thing – sometimes making your work as widely accepted as possible is the ticket to getting people to care about what you have to say at all. That’s huge! And isn’t that what so many of us want?

In the age of the internet, however, the line between us and our content becomes blurred. I use the term ‘content,’ which makes all of us want to bash our heads against the wall, broadly. Maybe you are sharing your poetry on Instagram, or you make skateboarding videos on TikTok, or maybe you’re testing out jokes on Twitter.

Regardless, the profile you’re posting from is connected in some way to you.

I think one of the dangers of social media is that often times, we are the content.

If you’re sharing your work, it feels bad if you don’t get much recognition for it, or if for some reason it didn’t get many likes. Conversely, it feels validating and motivating when your work gets shared widely, and you get lots of comments about how what you made affected someone else’s life. That’s so powerful. Because that’s what it ultimately comes down to, right? Connection. For most online creators, we post in the hopes that our posts are seen. That they make an impact. That they matter.

We all want recognition to varying degrees, of course. Some people will break their backs trying to follow the trends, using as many relevant hashtags as possible, maybe even succumbing to making “rage bait” videos for the sole purpose of blowing up, regardless of if the majority of the attention the creator receives is negative. For others, like me, we don’t need or necessarily even want a large audience (which is good because often times, we don’t get one), but a little attention feels nice. I make YouTube videos primarily about beauty standards, self image, and LGBTQ+ issues, so when people comment that they related to something I said, it feels worth it to be vulnerable so publicly.

But a lot of people using social media aren’t trying to change the world, and most of the time when I use it I’m not either. My Instagram is very informal and, naturally, most of the posts are about me and my life. That’s what most of us are doing. And that’s where things get tricky. Really, all of us, in the sense that we put content out on the internet, are “content creators.” Sorry to use the term, but it’s true. (Side note: so many content creators respond to the descriptor as if it’s a slur, myself included. Why?)

Normally when people think of content they think of carefully crafted videos, or music, or writing – art of some kind. When you post this sort of content, a post performing poorly can be interpreted as “people don’t like my art.” But when you’re the content, your selfie performing poorly becomes “people don’t like me.”

This is dangerous.

We all want to be liked. We can pretend that we don’t, or that what others think is of little importance to us (and maybe it is, but that “little” still counts), but at the end of the day humans are social animals who long for connection and to feel like they are a part of something. Rejection, real or perceived, stings.

Every time we post online, we are opening ourselves up to the possibility of rejection. When the stats are made available to us (this post got 67 likes, your last one got 138, your average is 108), naturally we want to see them, and the animal inside each of us wants that number to be higher. That’s how I used to think, too. I’m 23 now so growing up in the digital age, I’ve known about the algorithm since I was what, 12 years old?

This is how a lot of us feel, and we shouldn’t be ashamed of it! But we also shouldn’t be in denial of it. In order to face the beast (external validation) head on, we first have to admit that the beast exists.

A lot of social media comes down to adapting to care about information that, if it wasn’t handed to us so blatantly, probably wouldn’t take up much of our mental energy. If you couldn’t see who’s following who, or how many people viewed your story, or if somebody has opened your dm yet you might wonder about these things, sure, but would you really care that much? Probably not. But it is available to us, and not just in the ways I’ve mentioned. For example, kids can see exactly where their friends are and who they’re with on SnapMaps (a feature that, since day one, has felt eerily Orwellian to me). Doesn’t that seem scary to you? And really, is there anything positive that comes from that? We weren’t designed with the ability to process this much information about this many people, and our nervous systems are wired and our hackles are raised in the pursuit of trying.

How do we stop caring about the algorithm?

I don’t know!

Okay, that’s my article. Hope you enjoyed it!

I jest.

But on a serious note: I don’t know. I don’t have all of the answers. But I do have some, and this is my advice. As someone who uses the internet for my creative work and just for fun, I have a lot of experience with the algorithm from a “business” perspective and from a personal perspective. This is what helps me, and I hope it helps you.

1. You have to have an enriching life outside of social media and the internet. Get out into the real world. When you’re glued to your phone, constantly refreshing the apps to see how well your post is doing, it starts to feel like it all matters way more than it does. When you have a meaningful, values-driven life off the phone, everything that happens on the phone starts to feel less important.

2. Some posts are going to do “well”, some aren’t. That’s just the name of the game. It’s not always a reflection of you and what people think of you. I would honestly even go as far to say it’s usually not a reflection of you and what people think of you. Sometimes people are online, sometimes they’re not. Some people are on different time zones. Sometimes social media sites shadowban you, sometimes for no reason. (But if you posted something political, usually something far leftist, it is probably for that reason – don’t let that stop you from sharing your voice.)

3. If you are starting to care more about what’s happening inside your phone than in the real world, take a real break. For a while. What I like to do when I feel this way, or if I just feel like I’m wasting my time online, is deactivate my Instagram account. I don’t know if you can do this on Twitter, TikTok, or Snapchat as I do not have any of these, but on Instagram when you deactivate your account, your profile is no longer searchable or usable until you reactivate it, at which point you can resume using it the way you did before deactivating. Sometimes taking a break from the internet can do wonders in terms of getting us in touch with the things that truly matter to us whether it’s reading, writing, spending time outdoors, connecting with friends face to face, whatever.

4. Lastly, remember that your online presence and how it’s received has no affect on your worth or importance as a human being. Everything that really matters happens offscreen – how you treat people, your relationships with others, the activities you enjoy. As much as social media might feel connected to your value as a person, it isn’t. Would you tell your friend that because her selfie flopped, she is any less wonderful than she was before? Would you tell that to your mom? What about your partner? No! Because it’s not true! So why say that to yourself?

Anyway, I don’t have all of the answers, but that’s what I got. I hope this essay (my first real post!) resonated with you – actually, do I hope that? In an ideal world, you wouldn’t relate to any of this at all! No one would! But we don’t live in the ideal world unfortunately. So yes, I hope this post resonated with you and more importantly, that my advice does.

Xoxo,

Grace