Unexpected thoughts or the power of a good question
On sharing my thoughts and looking for joy
Two things keep my mind occupied lately. Strike that. Many things keep my mind occupied lately, but to some there’s no easy solution and it will take me a while to get to the point where I’m happy with how the things are. But the two things I want to talk about are: not writing here regularly, because I often feel like I have nothing to say (which probably isn’t true, it’s just that I think that nobody wants to hear / read what I have to say) and the other is that lately I don’t feel like talking about books I’ve read.
I shared the latter thought on my Instagram this morning and one person asked me where do I write about books. I answered that only on there, but I am thinking about writing about books on my Substack. Which wasn’t true till that very moment. I haven’t consider this possibility even for a second, before writing this answer. And it struck me (just like a good question can) that this is it. It’s not that I don’t feel like writing about books, it’s that I don’t feel like writing about them on Instagram. So maybe my Substack is the place to share my thoughts on books I’m reading and talk to others about them. Maybe it’s a better place than Instagram.
It’s not that I’m leaving Instagram. Not yet anyway. Although this thought is been coming back to me regularly in the past couple of years. But what keeps me there is the bookish community, the people I can talk to about books, reading habits and other weird book-nerdy stuff (although it’s not what it was, there are less interactions, more scrolling without thinking, at least that’s how it feels for me). So maybe if I moved my bookish stuff here and to my blog it could compensate for when I eventually decide to leave the instaworld or when the app will implode or change even more into something I just can’t accept any more.
More and more people are leaving Instagram and social media in general. Just this morning I saw two people talking about it on Notes. And talking about Notes, I still can’t find my way on it, but it’s probably because I feel that there are some rules to using it and I don’t know what they are. But maybe, I just need be my rebellious self and use it the way I want to use it and not worry what others think about it? There’s nothing like trying to follow some unwritten rules to take away joy of connecting with people through the internet. I noticed it so many times already. It was like that with my blog, Instagram and now I also see it here.
There are people who love to talk about the ways we should be showing up, how we all should be busy with building something (bigger audience, business), how we should be doing something and not the other thing. This is what keeps me away from sharing my thoughts, the little joys of everyday life.
What I’m looking for is ease, spontaneity, a bit of a mess, the joy of this miraculous thing we call internet.
Hi Anna. I empathise with you! Instagram has not been the same since everyone started posting videos instead of photos, not hat I am there for. Like you I am not sure how much longer I will post there.
For books my favourite platform still has to be Goodreads and I do still post on my Book Blog though it is not read as much as it used to be! I think blogging has changed, no one has the time any more, life is sadly led at such a fast pace by the majority.