Reconnecting with Creativity

Recently I've gotten really frustrated with the way the internet is. I've posted about it before, and then always just went back to the way things were, mindlessly scrolling for hours and always feeling bad afterwards. And then I fell down a rabbithole of digital minimalism videos on youtube, and the more I learn about the algorithms and apps and smartphones etc. the more I am sickened by them. 

Learning about how the companies manipulate and use you made me look inwardly and realize how addicted I have become to my phone and how miserable it makes me. I never finish scrolling Instagram and feel happy, my mind always feels gunky and anxious. 

I reflected on how over the past several years, I've let media convince me that my ideas and my self expression are not enough if other people do not appreciate it. 

I think it all started when I posted photos of the kind of tropical gal outfit that tends to get likes online. From that moment, I realized how good it felt to be the kind of person that got compliments online and at conventions. I didn't even get very much attention online really, but it was more than I was used to. I felt like I had to keep up that look and it destroyed my self-image. I felt ugly if I wasn't wearing dramatic makeup, tanning, getting super long nails and wearing over the top outfits. I felt like I had to have the perfect image of gal all the time or I wouldn't be worthy of friendship. If I stopped doing any one of those things, I felt like no one would accept me anymore. I started equating that specific look with my worthiness as a person. Old habits die hard, and I eventually realized I had made gyaru into another rigid set of rules I felt that I needed to live by in order to be accepted and avoid ridicule. I didn't feel free to explore ideas and make up my own mind about how I wanted to look anymore. 

I value creativity a lot, and my freedom to create outfits that I thought looked good felt stolen by this pressure to attain external validation. 

Here's my most important thought. I want to be free to wear exactly what I want, be inspired by what I want, and look bad if I want. I want to look ugly if I want, and not care if someone comments on how I'm doing everything wrong. If I like the way I look, why does it matter if someone else says it's ugly? No one I want to be around would abandon me for looking ugly anyways. I don't think it matters to me if other people think I'm a gal or not. I don't want to dress for others as a performance anymore. 

I no longer want to be a product for social media to profit off of, so I finally deleted Instagram from my phone. I think I feel better now that it's gone. 

For the first time in months, I opened up my surf and gal magazines from around 1999. I felt so happy looking through them. I felt inspired to create again. I saw photos of people I think are cool, but felt no pressure to look exactly like them. In fact, I felt relaxed seeing outfits that I can actually imagine myself wearing in my daily life. 

A large part of me reconnecting with my creativity is using my phone less. I wish I could eliminate a smartphone completely, because honestly I don't trust myself to not scroll on something even without instagram, but for several reasons I'm not able to get around day to day without it. I want to get an mp3 player, digital camera, and a watch so that I can eliminate most of the reasons I end up trapped somewhere in an app. I always end up opening my phone for one of those and then end up on some other app wasting my life. If I don't need to open my phone, I think the chances of that happening are far less. 

I don't know if my journey will be successful, or if I'll even want to post about it or post here at all. I could write private posts but I think part of myself still wants to connect on the off chance someone here feels the same way I do. 

I think I'm starting to feel more like myself again, and that makes me happy ✿◕ ‿ ◕✿