Hello!

An Invitation into Authenticity

I am so excited you’re reading this.

This is not just a writing platform and this is not just a post (says every therapist ever).

Over this past year, I have felt increasingly exhausted with social media. With the changing algorithm, with the pressure of constant output.

I felt robbed that my creativity was being used and exploited to create content that I don’t even own. As in, Mark Zuckerberg could turn the “off” button on the social media platforms we inhabit and I would lose the work I’ve invested so much of myself in for the last three years.

Creating this space on Substack is taking ownership of my creativity. Creating this space is releasing the experience of victimization by social media platforms (don’t worry - I’ll unpack that word soon). Creating this space is, to risk sounding cliche, a lifelong dream come true.

I am a therapist but I’ve always wanted to write. Therapy created for me a pathway to my inner wisdom to share but I am in my bones a writer. From my great-grandmother (both before and after her time), writing is a familial passion. I love the flow of writing, the capacity for channeling that arises.

In many ways, because this has been my dream for so long, it was also the thing I was most terrified to do. Isn’t that how it works most of the time? What we really want, we are too afraid of losing at some point so we stave disappointment by “settling” for what we think we want. For what we are told we want. We end up just prolonging our suffering.

Connecting to and trusting in my desires has created the inner space I’ve needed to allow my dreams to come true. It sounds so silly, like of course we want our dreams to come to fruition! But when we really, truly want something with the fullness of our Being, it is vulnerable. In that vulnerability, we feel the exposure. In the exposure, we feel the potential of harm, of disappointment.

It is the same protecting coping mechanism that has us emotionally contorting ourselves into personas that we allow to be seen by others. This protects us from REAL rejection because if no one really knows us, then we can’t fully be rejected. This leads to a different suffering: being completely and utterly alone. To be unknown as social beings (us humans), is annihilation. We need to be known. But to be known for authentic self is risk REAL rejection because when someone knows us, they can fully reject us.

In the same way, if I focus on other pursuits instead of following the path of my dream, I can always exist in the fantasy of what could be. I can protect myself from being rejected by publishers, by potential clients, by ANYONE. If I’m pursuing something I don’t really want (even if it’s something I enjoy or am fond of), I am not really risking anything.

The fantasy of what could be is an illusion that we feel satisfied with the imaginal, to risk bringing the dream into reality would shatter the illusion. We relate to a fantasy mirage, a hologram of what our life could be, because it is safer than pursuing the dream.

It is also less satisfying.

I thought I wanted to be an Instagram therapist.

What I really wanted was freedom, community and creativity.

The part about Instagram I like is writing captions and finding photos that evoke similar feeling. The part about Instagram I like is connecting with people passionate about similar things.

By focusing on what I liked about social media, instead of feeling powerless to the algorithms demands, I was able to hone in on what I truly wanted.

So no, this is not just an ordinary post.

This is a risk in trusting my desires to create a life I love.

• What are you willing to risk for the life you love?

• How can you trust in your desires?

I am so excited you’re here.