2 Of The Hardest Decisions I Had To Make In Life Led Me To Freedom

I packed up, left everything, and disappeared from social media.

I have made two life-changing decisions in recent years. The first decision was deciding to leave the place where I spent much of my life, St. Paul, Minnesota. The second decision was to delete all of my social media except Twitter. During the decision-making process for leaving Minnesota, I had a job opportunity in San Francisco, California. There were a lot of things happening around me that made me feel like Minnesota was no longer home. When I decided to delete all of my social media accounts, I was feeling burnt out and unauthentic. I felt terrified about making both decisions. I was about to destroy my entire identity because it was attached to this one location. And when I decided to ghost social media, I felt like I was severing all ties with everyone.

I took action even though I felt fear and found a sense of freedom from both decisions.

I was under the illusion that the people on social media were my friends.

Social media has made people socially lazy. The days of calling friends to see how life is going are gone along with other social traditions. Now the activity is replaced with lazy gestures such as liking posts as if that is a form of keeping in touch.

When Facebook first hit the scene over a decade ago, I was late to the party. When I got familiar with the platform, I thought it was a strange thing. People posting everything that they did in the day was a bit narcissistic. It was as if anybody could be a mini-celebrity by thinking people actually cared about what they did. Then my girlfriend at the time convinced me to sign up so we could post “In a relationship.” I was then sucked into the social media vortex. Over the years, I developed a dopamine overload from getting my travel pictures liked and getting lots of engagement along with my thoughtful deep posts. I was disillusioned thinking that people actually cared. I commented on people’s posts and instant messaged friends thinking it would be reciprocated. I genuinely had the best intentions but I was a bit idealistic buying into Facebook’s marketing tactic of “keeping in touch.”

I found freedom in leaving social media. I no longer have to attempt to try to stay in touch with people who probably no longer know that I still exist. It made me realize that the majority of my Facebook friends didn’t care for me as a person. I was just dopamine entertainment just like scrolling through Instagram or a Tik Tok feed. My real friendships are now offline. Eventually, I will log back into the shallow abyss of social media due to business purposes but I now have the discipline that I didn’t have before to not lose myself in it.

My entire self-image was created by living in one location.

The places where we spent our most important years of growth are a blessing and a curse. It shapes us and molds the person we become for better or for worse. It is the power of our environment.

I have been a nomad for my entire life without even knowing it. My mother and I moved around each year since I was a child. The very first day I moved to Minnesota from Arkansas, I felt like I didn’t fit in anywhere. I had some sense of stability with friends and a community but I always knew I would leave. I never committed to moving because I valued my friendships. The friendships that I made in Minnesota were important to me. The lesson I would learn from that is putting other people above your own desires can backfire on you. The very same people I stayed in Minnesota for were no longer around. It was then that I knew I had to put myself first and make a move.

I found freedom in leaving a place that I used to call home. It made me realize that home isn’t a location. It is about how the people in the location make you feel. I have lived in many places since and I have had better life experiences. You go where you are celebrated, not tolerated.

Having freedom in your life comes from the most unlikely places.