Are you truly living as the manifestation of YOUR OWN chosen thoughts and ideas? I recently unplugged from mainstream social media that sucked my attention like a hungry parasite. And since then, I have noticed one thing: people actually do most things because everyone else is doing it. Not because they really wanted to, or because they sat in a corner, introspected, and had that aha moment of springing into action to bring a thought to life. Ha, I have the word for it—peer pressure.
We are all just living in a massive classroom, with chatters bouncing off walls, hitting our consciousness and subconscious alike, making us act in ways we do not even subscribe to. Or… how do we even know if we ever subscribed to it in the first place? Apologies for the existential crisis ramble.
For example, in the corner of social media that my feed literally feeds me, people no longer do birthday cakes, the whole singing charade, and blowing candles to make a wish. Instead, they buy a bunch of outfits, have a glam team doll them up, and post a carousel of photos for thousands of strangers who will hit “like” and send a rush of dopamine straight to the account holder. It is fun. I have done it, and it was only because others were doing it, and I thought it was the way to go. But hey, I get it. Do what makes you happy.
I just want to draw our attention back to pulling out of ourselves what makes us us. It is so easy to get lost in the sauce, in the chatter, in the trends. Do we even still sit, introspect, think about the hard things, and visualize how we can get better, and maybe make the world better in the process?
Vocalizing dissent in today’s world is further eroding our sense of self. If you do not agree, you are “difficult to work with.” If you do not participate, you are “a weirdo.” If you do not show up, you are “selfish.” The list goes on. The world continues to spin. And if you are part of the crowd of dissent, you remain you.
I remember being given a ridiculous piece of feedback that completely betrayed my natural way of being. “You talk in such a monotonous way. The audience will fall asleep. Repeat this slide again.”
I did—again and again. Nothing changed, and eventually, the feedback giver gave up, hoping I would magically change next time.
Mind you, I have given dozens of presentations, holding the attention of the very people I am speaking to. “You want me to sound just like you in order to be heard?” Nope. Not going to do that.
And I was not being difficult. I was just being myself. Anything different would have been forced, and yes, weird.
Being yourself, your true self, I mean the version that is not influenced by culture imposed on you, or one you hesitantly adopt for convenience, is what it means to be free. To be free is to consciously choose what you want for yourself. That is how you thrive. That is how you become. That is how you self-actualize.
Because without the real you, thriving becomes confusing and stagnant. Kind of like walking up an escalator that is going down.
Become a vessel that actively makes choices, informed choices, every second. Not one that simply absorbs random chatter bouncing off the walls. I have learned that the real me thrives and breathes actual air, while the peer-pressured me struggles, failing to turn on the oxygen tank, which was the real me all along.
Thrive Mode 