Have you ever had one of those moments where you knew you needed to stop and take it in? I usually recognize these moments by how my shoulders respond. When I feel a tangible reassurance about the trajectory of my life; my shoulders will naturally tilt back and down. (*Cue awareness to the posture of your own shoulders in this moment.) The weeks leading up to this makes so much sense now. I may circle back and share on this in a future post. I actually screenshotted my phone Friday night for validation to my self of the feelings I just encountered at 2300 (11 p.m.)on 5/24/24.
Here’s the screenshot of MY most recent shoulder lowering moment.
That was bold of me to insert that screenshot of my phone. Because I potentially lost a handful of you already. I can hear it now, “She’s one of those aesthetic girlies with her muted phone icons.” “How does she even get her icons to look like that?” Or I simply lost you with the fact I utilize military time. But please hang with me; as there is a lot of pressure on THE first Substack post and I’m just now learning my way around here.
Earlier on this Friday afternoon, I listened to a podcast episode from Bad on Paper with
and . The podcast was centered around social media addiction, the awareness we can bring to this as individuals and ways you can modify your habits with where you choose to spend your time. Bad on Paper interviewed , well known on Substack for her 30k subscribers for her Morning Person publication. She shared about how she shows up on her Instagram account with over 21k followers only once a month and has the app deleted off of her phone. She explains she has to redownload the IG app each time she decides to check in with her community and make a post, and soon after re deletes the app. This is form of boundary she has set for herself.I highly recommend this pod if you own a social media platform at all. You may listen in here. As I was washing dishes with one air pod in my ear listening to these women chat about social media addiction; there was one concept that truly washed over me. They began discussing how often they encountered the feelings of needing to share delightful things with their viewers on Instagram BEFORE they could enjoy it for themselves. That point struck me and caused me to reflect on a few moments that week where I shared in solidarity of these feelings. Just this week I was struggling with this new demanding pressure I was experiencing of sharing certain things in my IG stories before basking in my own joy of it. Some examples I could think of right away was opening a new flavor of Olipop that I prepared over ice with a glass straw. I felt the need to snap a picture of it in my stories BEFORE I enjoyed even the first sip.
Another example was capturing a sunset back drop with a water fountain spewing into the pond behind my dog Yogi. I felt all of this overwhelming push to capture this in my IG stories in real time. You could hear the the sounds of the water and the audible chatter of the ducks and see Yogi sprinting across the dog park. The unfortunate part is by the time I glance back up from my device, the sunset is over. Missed. I missed something with my life because I was too busy puppeteering an illustrated version of myself in an Instagram story. Ugh.
This is the exact feeling these women are commiserating about on this podcast. I had to pull my airpod out of my ear, set it firmly on the counter and finish the dishes with only the sounds of the air conditioner and process all of this.
Once all of the dishes are returned to the cabinet. I have this self realization: This is my life. I picture myself stomping my right foot into the ground with a furrowed brow. THIS IS MY LYFE’ FIRST. I thought.
I coined this spelling of the word lyfe’ on my own tiny corner of the internet any I time discussed life with emphatic meaning…which is pretty much all of the time. I preach the idea of #timeisthenewcurrency and encourage my followers to try to stay enchanted with the simple beauty of lyfe with daily inspiration. I also prioritize sharing a reminder for people to stop mid scroll while viewing my stories and challenge them to do this…
Take the deepest breath you’ve taken all day.
Hello, I’m BeckA. I’ve been micro influencing people to live their lyfe from one shoulder lowering moment to another. I’ve been sharing inspiration and lyfe helps since 2020 when I really became a creator of influence more so than a consumer of influence on social platforms. It was the pandemic, I just birthed a new soul into the world, my son Atlas. My son was breastfed and I was mentally not prepared for the feelings of entrapment I would encounter of being secured to a chair or bed to nurse 9-14 hrs of a 24 hr day. So I guess you can say choosing to breastfeed my first born son in 2020 was the catalyst for my social media addiction. So for 4 years now I’ve got to play in this creative outlet of micro-influencing on social media platforms; mainly Instagram. According to AI Overview, “a micro-influencer is a social media user with a small but engaged following of 1,000-10,000 followers who focuses on a specific niche or topic.” Although I have 1,001 IG followers at the time of this publication, one thing I’ve prided myself in is just how many people view my stories regularly. My Instagram story viewers range from 88 people to 232 people that view my content loyally on a daily basis. This averages to 15% of my followers are consuming aspects of my lyfe in real time… every…day. For an account with 20,000 followers this would mean an average of 3,000 story views daily with an equivalent percentage of 15% but statistics continue to reveal influencers of 10k or more have a daily viewing percentage closer to 5-9%. I’ve had the urge to want to release this commitment entirely for months, but the amount of people that show up each day continue to keep me sharing. Substack may not be the answer to all my problems but it certainly feels like a breath of fresh air for me. It kinda feels like my out. It’s time for a creative pivot. Here’s a quote from
from her fantastic post titled: The Renaissance of Substack: Is Blogging ACTUALLY making a comeback? She does a brilliant job of highlighting six (6) points on why content creators are paying attention to the resurgence of long form content. I definitely SEE it! Read more hereSo, where do we go from here? Embracing the renaissance of Substack and blogging doesn't mean abandoning social media altogether. Instead, it's about striking a balance and leveraging each platform's strengths to amplify your message and reach a wider audience.
ContentbyCass
So I’m officially making my first formal announcement on Substack:
I’m breaking up with the gram’.
It will be a “we can remain friends at a safe distance” kind of break up. My action plan is to tackle my social media addiction by way of Substack. I’d like to reprioritize my time to growing my writing skills, nurturing a weekly newsletter and prioritizing intentional breathing. This post is a form of personal accountability to continue to publish on my Substack for one full year.2 I am also completing my breathwork facilitator certification and plan to share some of the clinical data and benefits that I learn along the way in my personal breath work journey.
I feel the best part about Substack so far is the relief that this account will grow with me. This is not something I have to have perfectly curated right away. And yet, this weekend I have felt so creatively motivated I did sit down and start doodling with my finger on an Ipad while my son played with Batman. I’m eager to see what’s to come.
I’m thrilled to add to the parade of creators marching away from social media and towards platforms such as Substack. It’s really beautiful that Substack repositions autonomy to the individual while simultaneously shutting OUT some of the noise.
Thank you to the Bad on Paper pod that empowered me to shift creatively'; for me.
I’d also like to thank myself in advance for clicking “Send to everyone now”.
I’ll leave you with the last screenshot I took on my phone. The quote is by Debbie Ford. I saw it last night on my Tapping Solutions App that my husband and I fall asleep to each night. We are currently deployed working a major wind event in southern Texas in our camper. We own a catastrophe insurance adjusting business and travel 4-5 months out of the year for our primary source of income. I plan to keep sharing educational content on the insurance industry and about our storm lyfe on TikTok. My husband and I just got married in March of 2024. I’ve also already added, Why you should get married in a castle? to my future Substack content punchlist.3 Definitely watch for this one!! 🏰 If you’re interested in connecting with me outside of Substack, for now our storm chasing Tiktok is the direction I’ll point you.
Live in the knowledge that you are a gift to the world.
Debbie Ford
If you are new to Substack like me I’d like to take a moment to empower you to start typing. Your presence is a gift and your stories, thoughts and perspective have value. I welcome all of the substack insight as I nestle myself in my new tiny corner of the internet.
Breathe in… Breathe out gently.
BeckA 🎠
Sorry about the robotic audio clip. Like I said; I’m new around here and it wouldn’t be a FIRST post if it didn’t have tons of grammatical errors, run on sentences and a glitchy robot voice.
One full year of weekly posts through Tuesday 5/27/25 is 52 weeks. That is my commitment to myself. 52 posts.
I utilize the reminders app on the iphone for color coded punchlists of daily and long term tasks. This weekend I’ve already added a new punchlist labeled: Substack Ideas💡At the very top of the list: Why you should get married in a castle?