Consumption Trumps Creation: On Content

One of the grossest terms ever coined is “content creator”. I can’t help but get the feeling that “content” is meant to be consumed, on to the next thing as soon as it’s finished. “Content” is cheap filler, thrown together with the cheapest ingredients, corn syrup-sweetened, and dyed to look like the real thing. Increasingly, our online spaces are inundated with highly-palatable, content-free “content”. 

Like Fruity Pebbles, I can get through the whole box before realizing I’m still hungry. My mind craves real connections, and consuming content is never going to scratch that itch. That empty feeling I get when I look up from the screen is indicative of a need that’s going unfilled while I’m cramming myself full of empty calories. 

For almost the entirety of human history, all of my interactions would’ve been with people I knew personally, the same 100 or fewer people I’d known all my life. Early in the days of social media, online interactions had the potential to follow the same path. Your Facebook feed showed only those you had chosen to be “Friends” with and you sought out the forums you were interested in. But attention can be monetized, and where there’s money to be made, someone will choose to make it, no matter the human suffering it creates. 

Now, do I think Zuck and his peers purposefully chose to make their platforms both addictive and depressing? No, I think they only cared about it being addictive and depressing was an unfortunate byproduct. I do, however, blame them for continuing down the path when the negative effects were made clear to them. But as old pal Upton Sinclair said, “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”

So, if the platforms aren’t going to get any better, I have to take things into my own hands. 

For one, I no longer have any social media apps on my phone. While there are some great things about being able to connect with people from all over the globe, I know my monkey brain wasn’t meant to be blasted with the worst (and therefore most engaging) news every day, all day long. I still have the accounts because, like I’ve said before, I can still see the glimmer of good in social media. I’ll just have to log onto the web version on the laptop. 

The laptop, a 2020 MacBook Air has been on the fritz (a topic for another day) and the replacement is going to be a Mac Mini - don’t get mad at me, I’m stuck in the ecosystem, I can only fight the man a little at a time.

When the iPhone goes, it might be gone forever, replaced by a flip phone, a nice camera, and getting lost sometimes.

Consumption Trumps Creation

Too much consumption that trumps creation / So many images, obliteration / I could see how late the sun sets / But I’m installing new reality / Proliferate our new appendages / That relay all our new messages

Stephen Steinbrink, “Trust”, Arranged Waves, 2014.

Feeling empty lately? Me too. Maybe it’s just that I work from home and my days largely consist of switching between screens but most days I come up for air at some point fully dispossessed of my own body. It ebbs and flows, of course but I can’t help but think my dissatisfaction with real life has something to do with my ability to firehose information into my brain 24/7. When I look up, everything seems grayer.

I consider myself a creative person, but what do I create on a regular basis? I force myself to play guitar, and every once in a while I write a song, but how much more would I get done if I wasn’t gravitationally attracted to screens all day long? I’ve seriously considered ditching my iphone for a flip phone. Aside - Ideally, I would get a phone with a slide out keyboard but our tech billionaire overlords have decided we would all rather strap our computers directly to our face instead. But if I get rid of my smartphone, how would I accept my two-factor authentication pushes for work? 

Even more bothersome - some of the things I still find enjoyable in analog life, adult rec league sports (lol, I know) and my artist collective, Meltwater Pulse, mainly communicate through online means: How would I respond to my kickball team group messages? How would I get feedback on the songs I do manage to record?

The big piece of advice for engaging your creative side tends to be “Get bored”. I’ve proven to myself that I can’t be trusted to stay away from technology long enough. Therefore, something major has to change. Right now, I’m not sure what that is…

Why Me?

I am often asked about my resume. What kind of path takes someone from a personal care company, to a radio station, to a legacy brand, to a startup coding bootcamp, to a 100+ year-old opera house? 

To give you some background, I’ve always been curious about the world around me. I got a bachelor’s degree in biology because I wanted to see a little bit about how the world worked. But that wasn’t enough. I wanted to be able to create! So, I applied to be a radio DJ and started a music collective and worked as a concert photographer. Again, I found that it wasn’t enough. I wanted to be able to build something bigger than myself. So I went to business school to figure out how to do that. 

Along the way, I learned how to organize processes and create a successful roadmap for the future.  I ended up applying those skills at both Harley-Davidson and devCodeCamp. I saw firsthand the differences between a small startup and a company that was founded when Teddy Roosevelt was president. I saw how effective communication at a small, agile company sets it up for success. In managing the transition from one ordering process to another at Harley, it became clear that a roadmap could only be as effective as the buy-in from every team involved.  

At Marquette Radio and Devils Lake Lavender, I began to really dig into the importance of the social aspect of a brand’s success. Through engagement with our audiences, we found great growth, making Marquette Radio a household name at the university and growing DLL’s Facebook page to over 4,000 followers in the first six months of operation. It was clear that understanding our core customer was the single most important thing we could do to grow brand awareness. 

After doing some freelance design work for the Al. Ringling Theater, built in 1915 as a gift to my hometown from its namesake, I was asked to step in as the Interim Director of both the Marketing and Community Relations departments. It was a daunting task. I would be taking over for two positions and starting on the first day of a three week run of musicals. I was intimidated but ready to take on the challenge. There is no doubt in my mind that my decision was one of the best I have ever made. Every day, I needed to employ skills I had been accumulating for my entire career. Every day was different. The uncertainty energized me and the triumphs bolstered my confidence.

Which brings me to the final answer to the question, “Why Me?” 

Tenacity, attitude, perseverance, and a knack for listening allow me to navigate the world around me with a sense of endless possibility - for myself, for my company, for our clients. What do you want out of our interaction? I can give it to you. That’s what sets me apart and that’s “why me”.

The Art of Tenacity

This post was originally published as documentation for graduates of devCodeCamp’s 12-week coding bootcamp as part of their job-preparedness training

Thousands of tools exist today to help you find the perfect career. This resource is one of them. However, no matter how many tools are invented, it will never be easy to find a job. The main point of this introduction is to prepare you mentally for the marathon that is the job hunt. This process will be full of ups and downs and there will no doubt be a point where you want to quit. Unfortunately for you, you’re not allowed to quit, sorry!

Job hunting requires tenacity, defined below. You have to decide that you really want what you’ve set out for yourself. Mentally preparing for this challenge will be incredibly important to your success. 

Tenacity is not a skill everyone is born with. Luckily for those of us who were not blessed with this gift, tenacity is something you can learn. Here are some of my tips for building tenacity. 

1. Practice doing things you don’t want to do. 

2. Find ways to make things you hate doing less horrible. Do you like listening to music? Maybe a snack once an hour will help you. Find your joy. Use that to make your experience better. 

3. Figure out when to put your head down and work through something and when to walk away for a while.

4. Learn how to take a temporary break to increase your resolve. 

5. Know why you’re doing something. Keep in mind these end goals when you run into roadblocks.

6. Keep in mind the following: When you have achieved your goal, you will look back on where you are now and be in awe of how close you were even though you didn’t know it. When you sit down at your desk at your first job, you’ll think back on where you were one week before, one month before, six months before, and a year before. You’ll remember how distraught you felt. You’ll remember how much you wanted to give up. Then, you’ll remember that you didn’t give up. Tenacity is a skill, and like any other skill, you have to practice it. Begin practicing now.