In today's world of mind-numbing apps and endless media streams that prioritize passive engagement and instant gratification over substantive, healthy experiences, it's easy to lose yourself in the noise and algorithm-induced despair.
As I approach forty years on this planet I have come to learn some hard lessons about denying my own nature to accommodate a status quo. I have discovered that the gaping holes in my life cannot be filled by anyone else. That the more I refuse to let the voice within me out, the longer I will continue to suffer in silence.
I am an introvert, and have never enjoyed talking. I have remained isolated for most of my life as a result, and while I escaped this for a time in film school, I ultimately found my way back to the kind of life I have always lived. A solitary existence, with few genuine offline connections. This is a reality that no community or app can cure completely. It's just a part of my nature and it's on me to make the most of it.
I have been turning to writing for answers to my own existence for well over two decades. It was the first creative outlet that freed me from the mundane and hollow world around me, where my voice never seemed to resonate. I cannot continue to deny what this medium means to me. As I have branched into new art forms I have come to feel the absence of what got me here in the first place.
Writing is and has always been my greatest salvation in life, and it's finally time for me to accept that I cannot simply walk away from it without destroying myself in the process.
This site will be a new home for me as a writer. A place of serenity for my mind, far removed from the mad flux of social media newsfeeds and that technological hijacking of human consciousness that is running rampant in our world today. Today's algorithms may never be able to accommodate the kind of material I need to create to exercise my demons and rediscover myself. So I am taking another route.
I am by no means proclaiming the antiquated blog format to be a solution to today's issues, nor am I expecting to maintain any kind of a readership. I simply know that if I continue to do nothing to address my need for writing in my life, I will never be able to succeed in the way I need to as a creative, and it will only hold me back in my other endeavors.
I encourage us all to take a step back and unplug from the unhealthy things in our lives today. To cut out all the noise and just see if we can start to hear ourselves again. It's time to live independent of social media success, and the content creator paradigm that is suppressing so much of our boundless creativity today to meet the expectations and demands of the inhuman mechanisms that dominate our lives in the modern world.
Real success has to come from within. All the followers and engagements in the world will not save you from the hollowness of a life without purpose.
I am not saying I have the answers, but I'm here to raise some questions and listen to the voice of reason within me that has no other place to call home.
Welcome to EJ's Mind.