In the olden days, when you wanted to follow a program, you needed tapes. Cassettes. You’d often have to buy them from the back of a magazine or some such. They might be about changing the way you think or losing weight or making money, learning a language. You’d send away, coupon and cheque, and the tapes would slowly wing their way to you in the post. Then you’d sit in your room/house/car and listen to them. You’d sit alone and learn about the thing. It was early days in the whole movement stakes.
Things have changed. We don’t really have tapes you send away for to learn how to be better, anymore. We have the internet. Instead of sending a cheque through the mail for something offering many promises and possibly dubious results, the ability to be a better you is all out there for free.
YouTube channels and Instagram and Facebook and blogs – all ready to tell you how you could be living/doing a thing way better than you are, all ready to give you the answers, just hit subscribe. No clipping and waiting for the postie. Just press play or follow, instead.
Something that was once the domain only of the dedicated – save up, clip coupon, write cheque, fill out coupon, post, wait, receive – is now available to all. And that something might be all about how you should eat/move/write/think/feel/even breathe.
Where it was once a commitment to find out more and follow a particular prescriptive path/lifestyle – now it’s easily done.
Maybe it’s too easy? We freely follow along, curious about the benefits others are getting, wondering if this path will work for us, considering if ‘the lifestyle’ we’re not living is the reason we’re the way we are.
Of course, we examine things critically, but many of us are also secretly hoping that this path that’s springing up in front of us, free and frequently published with clever-but-consistent hashtags and branded platitudes might be the very thing that makes us okay.
Urgh.
It’s not just us. Our kids are growing up on this stuff. Countless online tribes to join so that they might look or be or feel or think the way that seems to work for other people. They just need to pick a path and they too can be bombarded with constant messaging about the bits of their body or brain that might need to be tweaked or adapted and how they can FINALLY be okay. Oh PHEW. Shit.
I don’t really like it.
I think we ARE okay. We’re (nearly) ALL okay. If we could only stop assuming this constant bombardment of ‘better us’ was okay, we’d be even more okay. For realz. The bombardment is the problem, in my opinion (not imperfect us).
I think we need to turn our backs on the movements that want to prescribe us a better lifestyle and work this stuff our for ourselves. I reckon we should forget about brand-y hashtags and polished persons. Why don’t we just decide to be the way we are and stop letting people teach us about all the things that are wrong with us/what we do?
I think that is a really good idea.
I’ve come back to read this post again – I really like it. I think you are a movement creator, Pip. The difference with you and many of these instagram/lifestyle/holistic/green smoothie movement makers is that you are helping people to connect, and to be outwardly better people. The 52 hellos project you have started is a fine way to connect to old-school friendship. I love that you do these things.
Pip, you are so right.
This idea of “constant improvement” and constant change is such a furphy. It began as a management tool that I feel was designed to unsettle the workplace and ensure that staff were not stable and thus fearful of losing their jobs due to the change. Most misguided in my opinion. Then from the workplace it seeped into our private lives.
People need to just stop. Stop the constant idea that there is always something better or more to achieve. Just stop and enjoy what you have achieved thus far. Revel in it. Stop and relax. Calm your farm as my son says. Their needs to be peace quiet and tranquiity in your life. Otherwise you can never enjoy anything because its never good enough.
To paraphrase Erma Brombeck, the only place the grass is greener is over the septic tank.
Great painting as well Pip. My grandmother had one like that and it proudly sits on my cousins mantle.
Cheers,
Patrick
Patrick, you are very right (and you too Pip!). We do need to get over the Fear Of Missing Out, aka FOMO (it’s seriously a term!) and just learn to enjoy what we have. When you don’t want for anything, you can be happy. It’s this constant wanting that makes us miserable, no matter how fortunate we actually might be. Interesting what you say about this having started as a management style to make people worried about losing their jobs! I’m for self improvement but in moderation…and only if it actually makes you happy, and not wracked with guilt for what you could/should be doing 🙂
Totally agree. All this constant self-improvement is exhausting!
The bombardment is definitely a problem….I have small children, 8 and 5, I fear for what their lives will look like as they grow up, with all these negative influences (and horrible places) all over the internet….they’re digitally agile (can navigate better than us) but digitally naive 🙁 Here’s to outdoor play, imaginative play (any sort of non-tablet/non-digital play, really) that instills a strong sense of self-confidence in themselves that they’ll need to navigate the world they’re growing up in.
Pip, I’m claiming you as my spirit animal ok? Ok. Good. No wonder you have books waiting to be written in your head., you are SMART!
I had a complete AHA! moment today (sorry to go all Oprah on you) and this fits in perfectly. I was talking to someone about cognitive interruption and using the example of fear of plane travel. Everyone (including those fearful) knows that driving to the airport is actually statistically more dangerous than flying. But the available information (i.e. all the news articles about plane crashes) paints a different picture. I think social media is like that – intellectually we know that everyone is not leading perfect lives, that there isn’t some guru with the answers to all our problems, but it’s not enough to insulate us against the onslaught of available information, which does change our thinking and our mood and our perceptions of ourselves. So if we are collectively a little kinder, authentic and more accepting of how people are, rather than what they can be shaped into being, perhaps that will have an all round positive effect. Sorry that was a very long comment.
Oh Pip, I agree with you!!
So much be better at this and better at that, and so little you are okay, you are kind of wonderful, you don’t need to compete, even with yourself!!
Yes to this.
YES!!
Urgh to all of the improving via clicks and programs, and HUZZAH to accepting, to celebrating, to embracing who we are RIGHT NOW!
I always remind myself that these ‘polished persons’ are not as polished as they make out to be.. and those brand-y hashtags are nothing but really good marketing.
Best to be yourself, do the things that you are good at and just accept each other’s failings! We are bombarded by too much perfection these days on SM.
Nice post Pip!
Such a relief to read this Pip. I agree!!