 Hello there my beautiful internet friends. Welcome to a short but hopefully meaningful rant by yours truly I have recently joined tiktok as you guys know. I am not gonna lie. I absolutely adore the app I think it's so much fun. It's the least toxic place on social media that I have found so far Hopefully it won't get you know toxic if I that's not a word in the upcoming months and years It's just a lot of fun. I enjoy it what I have noticed though the audience on Tiktok is younger. So there are a lot of kids in like high school or early college Creating content and I see videos in my for you page, which is like the feed right like it's the stuff that gets recommended to you constantly Saying you know, I need this to blow up or like give me the hype I deserve the hype which is like I guess the hype is you know attention basically and You know if this doesn't blow up. I'm gonna quit tiktok and just people needing That attention needing eyes on them and then on the flip side of that there's a lot of Uh, I'll just call it hate for people who have made it for like the largest creators There are a lot of videos just bashing on them and being like, what do they even do? They're not they're not really working. They're not accomplishing anything Why do their videos get millions of views and mine don't get any and um, it's complaining really But again, the audience is younger and it's really Fascinating to me that that I would say 40% of the videos that are in my for you page Which is a huge amount have something to do with the idea of I need you to give me internet attention and I realize that some of this might sound hypocritical coming from someone who Makes videos for part of my living online. I like make money off of internet attention But that also means that I've had some experience with this And I hope that if you are someone who has felt this way that maybe That fact will lend a little bit of credibility to what I'm about to say here One thing that uh has consistently been commented on my videos that go To a large amount of people that have millions of views is You did this for the attention. You did this to become internet famous And this is cutting my leg off becoming an amputee. That's obviously a ridiculous statement And if you know my story, you know, it's not true But the amount of people who commented you just did this to get famous You just did this to get attention was so puzzling to me. I was like in what world Is internet attention worth every single day of your life being More exhausting every single day of your life being different like in what world is losing a leg Equivalent like it is a good trade-off for a few seconds of internet fame But so many people said that it's really gotten me thinking over the past few months That there is a lot of value placed on you know going viral and having the hype and being famous And as i'm on tiktok i'm seeing more of this People really seem to crave this people really really want this they want Likes on videos and views on what they create and believe me i get it. I do too. It's great. It's enjoyable. It's fun But i gotta tell you it's also super empty at the end of the day Okay, so allow me to pause for just a moment and clarify something I'm not at all talking about the youtube community or my experience here or the process of making videos or any of that being empty It's not it's been a huge blessing to my life But what i'm talking about is that the quote-unquote internet attention or internet fame or whatever you want to call it In and of itself is is pretty darn meaningless without the context Of the community and the ability to share my story and connect with people I have had a couple videos that have gone well over a million views Well over a million people have seen What I have created and I can tell you Conclusively without a shadow of a doubt It has not Improved my life. It has not made me feel better about myself. It has not fixed any problem It's not resolved any insecurity. In fact, it's probably hit on more of them. It has not Fixed anything The way that people talk about this The way that I see, you know, people go back and forth It really seems like they feel like it will Get them somewhere or or make them feel better about who they are and I just wanted to say that that's not the case One one person who I think is very interesting on tiktok is a girl by the name of charlie demilio. She is 15 I believe she's huge and she's one of the people that people really like to hate on their their big fans of you know Calling her talentless But if you see her interviews, she is a very sweet girl and she talks about Just wanting to like be herself and how her life hasn't really changed that much Now that she is like 17 million followers and how the mean comments like affect her, you know, and um, all of that and she's really resonated with me because She's an example also to a much larger extent of making it and yet She's still struggling with the same things that everyone struggles with I think it's really heartbreaking if if I actually let myself think about it It's really heartbreaking to me to watch so much of the world that I'm a part of chase something that I know Is empty and I love the internet like I love making videos I love building community and building connection with people online like that is not empty That is not meaningless like creativity and expression and sharing your story hearing other people's story is One of the best things in my life. I absolutely love it But simply getting people to view what you do and like, you know, click a button on their screen Somewhere in the world that you're unaware of is not going to bring you meaning is not going to bring you purpose Is not going to make you feel better about yourself for more than a temporary spike Like it feels great for a second. Don't get me wrong but I don't think we should be chasing this like we do like I don't know I feel like I sound like an old person right now being like you shouldn't chase attention on the interwebs, but that is sincerely What I feel like Again, it's it's great when people do pay attention to you, but If they don't know who you actually are If they aren't helping you work through the reality of your life of your situation What is that actually getting you? It's it's a distraction. It's a pretty shiny sparkly distraction, but that's all it is It's it's just distracting you from what's really going on Now what isn't a distraction is building connection with people in your lives building friendships building relationships It's also a lot harder. It's a lot harder to do that than to you know, just create something online And throw it out there. It's hard to be vulnerable with people in real life. I struggle with that I am pretty open online It's it's a lot harder when you're actually looking into someone's eyes when you are having a conversation with someone That's it's challenging, but it's so rewarding and it actually brings connection It helps so much with so many aspects of mental health be it, you know, your family or your friends or relationships or fill in the blank and If you're watching this and you want the hype and you're chasing it Believe me. I get it. It's fun. It's shiny. It's great But it's not going to give you everything you think it's going to give you If I can say anything I would so deeply encourage you To invest in yourself invest in the relationships with people around you Tell the people that you love that you love them spend time with them Don't sacrifice things that matter to you to get likes on some app or eyeballs on something you've created because you think that that will give you What value purpose Happiness fulfillment anything like that because none of those things are going to last when they come from this kind of a source Believe me. I'm not talking badly about social media. I greatly enjoy it. It has brought me Purpose it has given me a vision, but that's because It's what I do to some extent to help my mental health It's what I do to invest in myself to tell my story to hopefully help people I really want to do that. I'm very passionate about this and and that's why it's rewarding. It's not rewarding because You know seven million people have viewed one video. It has nothing to do with that So that's my that's my um millennial rant for the day And I appreciate you guys listening Please let me know what you think in the comment section down below I know this video is yet again a little bit different from my channel, but it was something that has been heavy on my little heart Because I I so don't want to see people chase things that are empty and we do a lot of that So if you have someone in your life who you love Maybe hug them today if you're a hugger if you're not don't do it You know maybe do something cheesy like say you you love them and you care about them or um, you know Just text someone and uh hang out with them in real life face to face It can be a good thing to do even though it takes a lot more energy to do so especially for us introverts Thank you to my patrons for making these videos possible. I truly appreciate all you do for me Thank you for spending a few minutes out of your day here with me today. Thank you I think I said thank you like eight times there, but I appreciate it I love you guys. I'm thinking about you and I'll see you in the next video. Bye