Speaker 1: So I cried on the internet, and there's a conversation.
Speaker 1: I've talked about it a while ago. I talked about
Speaker 1: it with michaela On here. So I think people call
Speaker 1: the relationship between people and their followers a paris social relationship,
Speaker 1: but I guess it's this different type of social relationship
Speaker 1: where you don't really know the people. And so when
Speaker 1: I first came on TikTok a long time ago, more
Speaker 1: than even Instagram, I would see people really emoting and
Speaker 1: crying about their skin, about their life, about their weight,
Speaker 1: about their loneliness, about their depression or anxiety. And I
Speaker 1: felt that sometimes that seemed dangerous. I thought that it
Speaker 1: seemed like, if you're doing it too much, you're kind
Speaker 1: of using these followers as your therapists, and some this
Speaker 1: boomerang can smack you, like a therapist is not only
Speaker 1: professionally trained, but they're there to support and listen. Sometimes
Speaker 1: people can really sting you on social media. So you
Speaker 1: could be crying about something and one day they have
Speaker 1: compassion for you and they're telling you everything you want
Speaker 1: to hear, and we're here for you. And then you
Speaker 1: do something wrong and unlike your therapist or your parents
Speaker 1: or your family, they're going to like come back and
Speaker 1: cancel you. So that's why it's a unique relationship and
Speaker 1: why I don't really advocate for people like all the
Speaker 1: time going on social media to treat your followers like
Speaker 1: your therapists or like your best friends or like your family,
Speaker 1: because the pendulum can swing and in a way that
Speaker 1: unconditional love family members wouldn't. And of course unconditional love
Speaker 1: family members can can, you know, cut you off, and
Speaker 1: there can be extreme circumstances. But by in law, you
Speaker 1: can make mistakes and tell people that you know that
Speaker 1: you messed up, and they will be a nice cushion
Speaker 1: for you. This is an environment where it could be
Speaker 1: oh my god, we support you, we love you. And
Speaker 1: also sometimes people like when someone's not happy and like
Speaker 1: they want you to be down, and then once you
Speaker 1: get happy, they're not. I mean, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: stuff that goes on because these are not professional So
Speaker 1: I don't really emote that much. I'll communicate and express,
Speaker 1: but I don't really emote, and I haven't really cried
Speaker 1: on the internet, and I have sometimes cringe when I've
Speaker 1: seen people do it, and I've done it on reality TV,
Speaker 1: and it's a cousin of this too, because it's a
Speaker 1: similar situation, and then there's an edited situation which is
Speaker 1: more scary. But after experiencing the loss of my mother
Speaker 1: and some traumatic events, I chose to post something that
Speaker 1: I thought was fascinating because before my mother passed away,
Speaker 1: I was really I just had sort of an emotional breakdown.
Speaker 1: I just was I just was not doing that great.
Speaker 1: Like I just wasn't feeling right, I was feeling unsettled,
Speaker 1: I was feeling not balanced. And I recorded this short
Speaker 1: video during a period of that, saying like I don't
Speaker 1: want I'm not I'm not doing that great, and like
Speaker 1: I basically need to stop. I need to stop this
Speaker 1: meaning social media. I need to stop working the way
Speaker 1: that I've worked. And I just I just it was
Speaker 1: not long. It was just very brief. It was just
Speaker 1: like a break and I said, I probably won't have
Speaker 1: the courage to post this and it's a little embarrassing.
Speaker 1: And then I was looking through my drafts today because
Speaker 1: I haven't been posting at all really on social media,
Speaker 1: very very minimal since my mother passed, and said, since
Speaker 1: I've been going through it and experiencing and not wanting
Speaker 1: to distract and divert because social media, when people say
Speaker 1: doom scrolling, you're diverting, You're just it's eating junk food,
Speaker 1: you're just watching crap to like just yourself. And I
Speaker 1: really have chosen, as I've talked to you about grief,
Speaker 1: the method of going through this stuff, so not like
Speaker 1: just taking the easy way out and not really medicating,
Speaker 1: not distracting, not going out, not you know, doing other
Speaker 1: things to distract. And so I was looked today and
Speaker 1: saw that video and I posted it saying how crazy
Speaker 1: that this is right before my mother passed away. And
Speaker 1: it was interesting because I really do believe in energy
Speaker 1: and signs and things like it's almost like your body,
Speaker 1: you know your body, or the temperature outside, or like
Speaker 1: there's her there's actually earthquake weather, like people in La
Speaker 1: I remember there used to be earthquake weather, Like it's
Speaker 1: so nice right before crazy earthquake. Or you can feel
Speaker 1: like the swell before hurricane or before like the ocean
Speaker 1: you could tell when a storm is coming. I feel
Speaker 1: like we feel that emotionally. And it was weird that
Speaker 1: I was just crying and I was like having an undefined,
Speaker 1: unspecified emotional experience. And then my mother passed away, and
Speaker 1: so I posted it today because I wanted to not
Speaker 1: only post when things are perfect. This should not be
Speaker 1: a habit of me just crying into the internet. But
Speaker 1: by the same token, I think that we should not
Speaker 1: always make it like things are perfect. Now. Forget the
Speaker 1: fact that people are showing filters and their perfect lives
Speaker 1: and their perfect vacations and their expensive bags despite maybe
Speaker 1: them being broke. They're bragging only about the good in
Speaker 1: a relationship. Despite the fact that social media is now
Speaker 1: a commercial marketplace. It is a television show is everything
Speaker 1: is for sale, and people are selling things even when
Speaker 1: you don't know they're selling things. People are finaggling and
Speaker 1: shady about the way they're doing it, and they're not
Speaker 1: saying that they're a partner, they're not saying that they're paid.
Speaker 1: But it goes so much deeper and so much more
Speaker 1: layer than that. So now you're on social media and
Speaker 1: treating it as like your friend and like your therapist
Speaker 1: and all this. So I think there has to be
Speaker 1: a balance between being authentic there and also just not
Speaker 1: overusing it. It shouldn't be a place to live, and a
Speaker 1: lot of people that are these influencers they're gonna be
Speaker 1: like child Stars, where it's gonna run out one day.
Speaker 1: This is not going to go on forever, and there
Speaker 1: are gonna be some emotional ramifications. It's just sometimes too
Speaker 1: raw and too real to be expressing and emoting all
Speaker 1: day all the time. So I think I'm developing a
Speaker 1: better relationship with it. Also, I just don't want to
Speaker 1: do it that often, and I want to live in
Speaker 1: what I'm actually feeling and not It's a great distraction,
Speaker 1: and the pandemic again made us insular, made us in
Speaker 1: our pajamas, gave us license to stay home and to
Speaker 1: connect with people that are, in many cases strangers. You
Speaker 1: get a familiarity with certain people, but they're not you know,
Speaker 1: they're not your best friends. And people expect something from you.
Speaker 1: Once you become an influencer or a famous person. People
Speaker 1: expect you're going to tell us about your money, your
Speaker 1: sex life, your relationship. You didn't tell us this, what's
Speaker 1: going on with that? Like as if they're owed something,
Speaker 1: And it's like you want to say to the people
Speaker 1: that are they're like, okay with you. Tell me how much?
Speaker 1: How many times a week you fuck your husband? What's
Speaker 1: in your bank account? How much do you make a year?
Speaker 1: You know, people are very very intrusive in a way
Speaker 1: that your own therapist will be a little more patient, thoughtful,
Speaker 1: all of that. So I think that's an interesting conversation.
Speaker 1: Where's the line, where's the balance? How much to share?
Speaker 1: How much not to share? Should you cry? Should you
Speaker 1: not cry? Should you be filtering, should you be faking?
Speaker 1: Should you be showing only the good and not the bad?
Speaker 1: You know what? Should you be on there only to sell?
Speaker 1: And then it becomes, you know, it's just a commercial space.
Speaker 1: So for younger kids, they have to know how to
Speaker 1: navigate this. This is why it's been so insane with
Speaker 1: all the shit that they're buying. And these kids are
Speaker 1: literally they don't even know what they think. They're buying
Speaker 1: peel peel products on their face at eleven years old.
Speaker 1: It's why there's that problem. It's aphora. They don't even
Speaker 1: know what they're buying. They're just buying pretty colorful packaging
Speaker 1: and what's being marketed to them. I give my daughter
Speaker 1: a lip oil today from a very major viral brand
Speaker 1: because like, it's not good, but I just knew that
Speaker 1: she would want it because it has this big viral
Speaker 1: brand name on it, and it's not a good product.
Speaker 1: I don't care if it's from the drug store or
Speaker 1: if it's this viral name product. But the truth is
Speaker 1: she cares because they're so influenced more than when we
Speaker 1: were kids. More than when we were kids. It was
Speaker 1: around Christmas, you know, the Cabbage Patch dolls and that
Speaker 1: shit would come and everyone will be obsessed, and yes,
Speaker 1: I get that, but it wasn't every minute of every day.
Speaker 1: This is all these fucking kids want is what someone
Speaker 1: else told them to want. It's really insane.