If You Must, Here is How to Be an Influencer Without Crashing Out or Losing Yourself

This posting stuff is supposed to be fun.

Image made in Canva by author.

A lot of creative types think that they have to build a large social media presence to market their projects and network their way into a sustainable career. Many of these shrewd professionals start off seeing their digital presence as only a means to an end but then develop a taste for it, until posting itself becomes one of their primary artforms (and creative energy sinks).

Other social media power-users become influencers because they have a community or a belief system they feel compelled to advocate for, and think dispensing regular memes/rants/hot takes will earn them a large amount of social goodwill they’ll be able to redirect toward their desired political calls-to-action, or personal ends. They think they’ll be able to translate likes and shares into boots on the ground (or butts in chairs at the workshops they’re selling), in other words.

Then there’s the social media figures among us who got into posting because we were simply too lonesome or disaffected to bond with many individuals in physical life, so we honed the ability to express ourselves in words or “content” because we hoped it would make us more attractive, or at least to fill the void of time.