Seven years ago, I wrote about the thin veneer of social media. That was a different life, a different time, a different world, a different me. Yet, while many things have changed, “fake it until you make it” is still the most damaging and counterproductive advice you can give someone.

Now more than ever, being your true self is the only path to happiness, and the only way to maintain a semblance of sanity in this increasingly sanitized, polarized, soft-censored, self-censored, self-centered, and curated online world.

Very little is real online.

Your friends’ feeds are curated to make their lives appear the way they think they should look to those on the outside, which is ironic, as that judgment is based on the falsehood of others doing exactly the same thing.

The opinions and language used by the content creators you follow are often tempered and self-censored in order to ensure they can be monetized and be brand-friendly. What they want to say is scrutinized, dissected, run through a boil wash cycle, and then reassembled, because they fear the rage of sexually frustrated keyboard warriors.

It’s sad that creatives have to fear the vocal minority, the people with so little joy in their own lives that reporting content that doesn’t fit exactly into their pathetically small worldview is the dopamine hit in the midst of pent up rage and loneliness that pushes them over the edge, and they sit in their own ejaculate hunting for the next person to argue with, to fuel the cycle.

It’s a terrible way to live, and I don’t mean the keyboard Karens and Chads, although their lives appear devoid of meaning.

I’m referring to the rest of us who bend to their incessant moaning, to those of us who carefully curate the outside view of our personal worlds to appeal to what we think others want to see.

I’m talking about the FOMO, the anxiety, the depression, the inadequacy that we inflict upon ourselves because we follow influencers whose entire lives are carefully crafted lies, assuming they are even real people and not entirely AI generated, and celebrities who have people to craft that lie for them.

And do you know what it gets us, besides huge therapy bills or really bad ~~drinking habits~~ coping mechanisms? I’ll tell you – sweet fuck all of any use.

But it does harm, and not just the aforementioned mental anguish, and stripping of your own happiness.

When nobody is authentic, society suffers. Proper discussion is impeded, and the vocal minority of extremists and scared, pity-worthy, low IQ, self-flagellating Francis’s get to dictate the conversation because the rest of us are too concerned with our image. This has negative knock-on effects all the way up and down the societal chain. But you’re a clever cookie and know that already, so let’s leave discussing it for another post.

Let’s get back to talking about you:

A lack of authenticity prevents others from relating to and bonding with you, online and off.

Sorry potential new friend, but you can’t come around for coffee because my living room never looks like it did that one time I took a picture of it when it was perfect – you know, before we actually lived in it daily. Also, I don’t look like my pictures because filters don’t work in real life and I can’t get you to only see me from above at a 35 degree angle and never look below my shoulders.

And I don’t really speak like that, because I’m deathly afraid of offending anyone accidentally. I actually curse like a drunk sailor realizing he blew all of his cash on the first night of shore leave. Where’s my rum?

If we were all a little more authentic, we’d be profoundly happier. If we posted honestly, shared honest photos, let people see that there are cracks in the veneer, we’d see that almost everyone else is just like us. Flawed, yet perfect in your own way. Happy in your own pants, comfy with the cat hair.

We’d be far more comfortable in collective imperfection.

And the rest of them, well they’re just posers. You didn’t like them in school. You don’t like them at work. You’ve called them names behind their backs at the bar. So why give their obvious lies any mental space?

Don’t waste mental energy on what some rando from the internet, whom you’ll never meet, thinks. And if your friends are judging you because you posted a picture of your yard where your lawn isn’t trimmed tighter than a fresh bikini wax, are they even your friend?

As my uncle says – “There’s only one ‘um. Fuck’um”.