Why I needed a break - Social Media in 2020 is an emotional contagion
In the words of the newly minted yardie Adele, Hello! It’s me. I was wondering if after all these years you’d like to meet and go over everything….HELLOOO FROM THE OUTSIIDEEEEE… jk we’re still inside because CORONA.
Which brings us to the topic of this first thought piece back - “Why I needed a break”. First I want to say thank you to everyone who has checked on me, and I’m sorry for falling off the face of the internet. I am more of an ambivert than anything else and I just haven’t been handling the pandemic and upheaval across the world and America well. This thought piece is a very different tone than the rest of my upcoming body of work because I want to explain where I’ve been mentally - not that I feel like I owe anyone an explanation.
Please note the rest of the pieces will go back to all things fitness, feting and wait for it.. TECH. Yes we’re adding tech to the scope of what we do here at The Last Mermaid because I work in tech and have been ignoring that part of me but I digress…
So my last piece was in (lol) March aka BC (before COVID-19) and my last IG post was about a month ago where I have - multiple times - told you guys some version of “I’m still here” or “I’m back” or something haha. But no, for real this time - I’M BACK BITCHES. I won’t say better that ever because we’re WIP at The Last Mermaid. So the conversation at hand for this thought piece is the emotional and mental impact of social media :) - bet you didn’t think I was going there haha.
To be very frank, the emotional impact of the past eight (8) months on my value system was a lot more than I could tolerate outside of small doses. The internets has been beyond negative - understandably so - CONSISTENTLY for basically all of 2020. And whether you realize it or not, this is likely affecting you on a much deeper level too. Steffen Steinhart (a neuroscience PhD) wrote and published a peer reviewed article (for my academics out there) “Corona and value change. The role of social media and emotional contagion” that speaks to this.
As an ambivert and an empath, I feed off and get drained because of the energy around me. It’s what will drive me out of or into my shell. When we’re all chipping down the road, thanking God for love, life and bacchanal it’s easy for me to be jovial Jae. But when the world is in disarray, with no clear path of the other side it’s not as easy to be a beam of light and joy ready to both give and receive love. While social media and the digital era has been amazing in terms of helping us build bonds and connections than can stand the test of distance and time; it has also created incubators of despair and hopelessness where we’re all facing the realities of not only our humanity but also the continued battle with race around the world and the fragility of the global economy. To quote Steffen “Based on the dynamic relations of values to each other and the way that emotions relate to values, a negative emotional climate can contribute to societal value change towards values related to security preservation and threat avoidance”. So I, living in a negative emotional climate reacted with security preservation and threat avoidance.
I write all of this to say that if you’re like me and not SUPER PRODUCTIVE in 2020; if your goals got stopped dead in their tracks and you’re just taking it one day at a time, you’re in good company. We’ll come back when we’re good and ready. For me I think that means now, so keep me accountable, and if I disappear again at least now you know why.
XOXO
Jae of The Last Mermaid