Real Words in a Filtered World

A soft rebellion against performative living.

We live in a world of perfectly posed selfies, curated captions, and highlight reels pretending to be real life. It gets exhausting trying to be digestible, likable, trendy, or aesthetic enough for the algorithms to even show your posts to your own followers.

But here?

Here on Substack… something feels different.

It’s not about algorithms. It’s not about performance. It’s about presence. It’s about being yourself.

People show up with real words, real stories, real life experiences. Messy ones. Raw ones. Words that aren’t trying to coach you on how to be an influencer (in most cases) or prove anything, just to connect.

I didn’t know how much I needed this until I found it. In fact, after I decided I was going to be brave enough to share some of my writing, I still put it off for months, trying to find the “right” platform. And when I researched platforms it kept coming up with Substack but for some reason I had it in my mind that it wouldn’t be a good fit. To be honest, I didn’t even know that much about Substack, So I’m not sure why I thought this. but I’d had something different pictured in my mind and what I had pictured wasn’t going to work for me.

I started on two other platforms before this one, both of which I very quickly realized were not a good fit for my needs. Then I decided “fine! I’ll try Substack!”. Almost immediately I was kicking myself for not being open to it in the first place. It didn’t take me long of actually using the platform myself to realize why it was the perfect fit for me.

You see, I was so burned out on social media from the last few years of always trying to be “on” to promote my business and the need to “fit in” to try and please the algorithm that I just didn’t want another platform full of fake people that would leave me feeling empty inside, or feeling like I have to make posting a full time job just to be seen.

It didn’t take me long to realize that Substack is a place where we can be ourselves, without shrinking, posturing, or polishing everything into perfection. It’s full of dreamers, and poets, and people who see the real beauty in the world and want to share it with others. And maybe this is what I’ve been needing this entire time.

Not 100,000 followers, but just people who “get me” or people who ignite my own passion and creativity by sharing their own.

And maybe that’s the real magic.

Not going viral.

But being witnessed.

“Have you felt this too? Tell me what brought you here, I’d love to hear your story.”