Jan 9

Jan 9 How Often Do You ___ Somebody Else's Stuff?

This post was first written back in 2014, but it still feels relevant (so I re-share it every now & again). Plus the music reference was already dated back when I first posted it, so, like a fine wine, yadda yadda yadda…

It's very easy to find yourself aimlessly scrolling through your sociables, routinely refreshing feeds and dashboards, all the while increasingly wondering:

How come nobody reads my posts?
How come nobody is liking/sharing my 🔥 #content?
Why does nobody leave any comments?
Et cetera and also other things?

I know this because I catch myself doing some variation of the above variations all the time. And if I do it, then you probably do it too. Because, deep down, we're basically made out of the same parts.

But what happens if you reverse those questions and ask them of yourself?

How many posts do I consistently read?
How much 🔥 #content do I see online but never like or share?
When is the last time I left a comment on someone else’s post?
Etc and other things as well?

You'll probably find that you're ignoring other people's stuff just as hard as it feels like they are ignoring your stuff. And that's pretty hard.

Since it seems like everybody is pushing something of their own these days —whether that be a blog, an album, a vegan cake recipe or a picture of their kids (we get it people, you did the dark magic and you made another human, but at a certain frequency some things are just cute for you ;)— there is a whole lot of passively skimming everyone else's stuff while waiting for a bite on your line. But if you can't be bothered to interact with the stuff of others, you really shouldn't be surprised at the lack of notification buzzes on your end. It's like Jesus used to always say,

"If y’all want others to do unto you, y'all gotta do unto others too."

So the next time you find yourself throwing a bunch of “how come nobody…?” questions around in your head, take a look at the browser history in your heart and see if the way you consume & ignore content online is a lot like how you wish people were not consuming & ignoring your 🔥 #content.

And then, maybe somewhere off in a dusty corner of your brain—while the last few turns of a new light bulb are being turned in the adjacent room—the chorus to that old New Radicals song starts playing…

…it's faint at first, but it gets increasingly louder as you reach for a share button you usually only notice when kittens r hazzing cheezburgers. And then you find yourself bypassing the favourite button in favour of the reply button. A conversation breaks out. It's brief, but it feels nice. That 1998 chorus gets louder and louder as you send an old friend a message that doesn't even include a link to your blog (ok… it totally included a link to your blog a few replies later, but you gotta spread that 🔥 #content somehow, right?).

Next thing you know, you're leaving a comment on someone else's blog, on a post that you actually read all the way to the end. You retweet a tweet that wasn't just a tweet mentioning something you did. And right before you can push send on an email you should have sent a long time ago, your phone buzzes with the buzz of someone, somewhere, doing something with your 🔥 #content.*

Maybe that old new radical was right? Maybe we do only get what we give? But, also, you gotta remember that you can only give so much — which means, annoyingly to the ego, you can only get so much too. So find the balance.