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founding

I had the good fortune of being hacked by some terrorist organization that posted something awful (my friends thought I'd been kidnapped) and permanently banned from all Meta platforms a year ago. Zero people at FB care. Nothing to be done. As a coach and a writer (and a mom with 12 fucking years of friends and pictures and HISTORY), that really sucked. But also, thanks Universe. I vowed to build my business on my own. So far, it's a really slow churn. Brutal. Maybe it's happening beneath the surface. Maybe it's manifesting in another dimension. Either way, it appears the cost of trying to do this without socials is too great. At least for now. So today, with my tail between my legs, I opened up a new account and got back into my old FB group. I'm currently high on dopamine because I have really missed the memes. OMG. Also, I got a bunch of Likes and welcome backs and new old people are reading my shit again. My analytics are on crack.

It is what it is. I have to go where my audience is. Social media is a double edged sword. I'm not putting the app on my phone (which is why I'm still sitting at my desk at 8 pm). But I'm back for now, mentally prepared for my illegal status to be discovered by the alogithm and kicked back into the void. Fuck them if it happens again. But I don't know what else to do. So I'll just keep trying what feels right in the moment.

I will say that I doubt your core audience cares if you post consistently. I am a lifer with you (you were my Day One) and I'll send you money as long as I have some to spare. I'll listen to your podcast when the next episode drops because it's worth the wait. And even if it isn't, I'll catch the next one.

I don't know who Kendrick Lamar is, but maybe that's because I've been living in the void. I'd love to walk away from the noise too, follow my inner peace. Good for that guy. But until I have an audience that will follow me anywhere and a team to hustle on my behalf, I'm smiling like I don't have a care in the world and posting that shit in my FB group. I'll hire someone to do IG for me, because bitch please. Unless I can't afford it. Whatever.

It's hard either way.

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Technology companies have spent billions of dollars developing ways to hack your nervous system and brain so that you become totally addicted to it. There is no way to outsmart it, manage it, tolerate it, control it. There is nothing wrong with any of us who struggle with it, we aren’t weak or dumb or pathetic. The algorithm is just too powerful for human nervous systems. Watch the social dilemma.

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Removed (Banned)Sep 1, 2022
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Aug 31, 2022·edited Aug 31, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

Gosh Holly, you hit the nail on the head for me this week. First, I want to say, I will accept the Monday email ANY day of the week, because schedules are hard and it’s more exciting that way! Second, gosh what a year it’s been for me, I narrowly avoided being hospitalized for my bipolar disorder and have spent the rest of the year trying to get stable. Safe to say, I am finally stable again. But fuck me if I ever get to that dark of a place again. I am doing everything in my power to avoid it. This week that meant calling out from work and going for a bike ride and resting instead. Listening to that inner voice is hard when there’s so much input from society, but damn it feels so much better to listen and lean in and rest. So much love for you as you travel on your journey. Keep writing, it’s changing lives. It changes mine almost weekly.

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Aug 31, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

Janeane Garofalo and Donna Tartt also have no social media presence. I read that when Donna Tartt is writing she sometimes put her phone on a shelf in a closet for weeks at a time. When she won the Pulitzer Prize she didn't even know until her agent finally got a hold of her. And everyone knows who she is. Or at least anyone who reads does. xo

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I wonder if people who are not like me (addicted to everything) can pick up social media in moderation? Like, can those people who can have one drink also just cruise Insta once a week?

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Aug 31, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

I totally respect your time and work pace. Glad you are honoring yourself. I have been in a similar space of trying to tune in and let my intuition guide me. I fight beating myself up for not doing more. I have a small business- always something to do. I just let so much more go. My anxiety is demanding it.

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

Maybe one of the best things that came out of losing my small business was the ability to drop FB and never look back. I hung on with IG until this spring, still haven't deleted my account because... just in case... but I empathize so much with people who want out and for whatever reason need to stay in the game. My mental health just couldn't take it and I don't know what I would do if my income/livelihood depended on staying on social media again.

I love this newsletter on whatever day, always look forward to seeing your name in my inbox.

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

I thought it was just me, although I know it's not, but sometimes I think that the fact social media breaks my brain means there really is something deeply wrong with me. It makes me feel freakin crazy and then I think it may be the wall in Plato's cave.

I don't really know who Kendrick Lamar is but it sounds like he might know what he's talking about. I'm happy to pay the price of not having a social media presence. I'm grateful I don't have to hustle to have a roof over my head.

Anyway, thanks Holly. Lots of love. Happy to receive your email whenever.

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

You know what to do. Last chapter of QLAW - The True Resistance!

If you had to drink alcohol to make money and keep a job - you would say Fuck that.

Your work is here for the long run - could impact generations to come. Not just current culture.

Are you trying to remind us or you that Instagram sucks and that tech companies do not have our best interest. And you are seriously considering starting a Tic tok account? For what? To sell a couple more books? Really?

True it gave you a mic but your message and you as a medium are so strong and powerful - you could have started by talking out on the corner of your local Starbucks and you would have made a dent in this world.

You know what to do. You made the case right here. The only hold it has on you is a perceived idea that you will make more $ from your book?

I love you until the end of time and I apologize for being upset in my post - but for the love of god ... do not get on Tic Tok! :)

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

I appreciate how this edition of your newsletter added another layer to the conversation swirling in our culture about social media. It is very easy for someone like me, whose livelihood does not depend on using social media, to quit social media. How do we take pressure off those who do rely on SM to earn a living?

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Ugh. All of this. Every word. The tangle of it all is so real and I feel it too in my own ways. Thank you for sharing on these topics in ways that dip just a little bit deeper into the true fuckery of it all than most I read. Your words are everything.

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

Love this essay so much.

I feel sad at what a lot of grown women feel they need to do, in order to be see on IG. I've told my girlfriends if they seem me lip synching or dancing...hold an intervention.

Maybe they should do that anyway as I'm off to Google "who is Kendrick Lamar?"

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

Thanks to you for peeling away some layers that aren’t as pretty as what others see or imagine. Too many just see you as this best-selling author & what a perfect person, picturesque life you must lead….Thanks to you for sharing flaws & demonstrating by your writing we all are trying. I often say (jokingly) that I will promise to do better in my next Pandemic! I’ll read your writing whatever day of the week it hits btw! Thank you again.

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

Love you xx sorry you had such a shitty year xx

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Sep 1, 2022Liked by Holly Whitaker

I was reading this and I wished I could listen to it with your voice. Just saying. Thanks for your mails. They are for me a way to reconnect to a part of me, that I right now feel disconnected on my own in the last months.

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