time spent offline

Making friends is easy when you go offline.

You don’t have much choice anyway. What are you going to do? Stare at a wall? No. You learn to appreciate people, love people, connect with people IRL. You don’t need social media to be social either. In fact, years and some effort later, I have become more social without social media and spending most of my time offline than while I was on social media and spending a great deal of my days online. The internet has this amazing power in convincing us that we are being social on Facebook while providing breadcrumbs of what it means to actually be social. To feel connected, I need a hug. A touch. A knowing smile, an eye-roll; a simple eye contact. I am biased but, since it happened to me, I believe a lot more people would be more social and cultivate better IRL connections if the internet disappeared tomorrow. Regardless, here are five tips for crafting a wholesome, algorithm-free social life that is fulfilling, enriching, and full of joy and excitement.

1. Visualize your ideal social life.

What do you want?

Forget reality and imagine you have the most fulfilling, enriching, exciting social life IRL. What would it look like? What would your weekdays look like? How do you spend your evenings after work? What about your weekends? What are you doing Saturday morning? In the afternoon? Who are you reaching out to to make plans with? Who is reaching out to you? Who are the people in your life? What kind of friends do you have? What kind of plans do you make? How do you spend time with people? What do you do on Sunday evenings? Who do you call when you have good news? What about bad news? Who loves you? Who do you love?

Because people are everywhere and there is plenty to do. After I stopped believing the lies— you need social media, you need a smartphone, you need “the internet”— it truly surprised me how many people to meet, things to do, and connections to be nurtured were all around me. I felt overwhelmed with reality. With all the people, things, connections all around, I realized the issue wasn’t lack of opportunity for a rich social life as much as it was a lack of clarity. You cannot get what you want if you don’t have clarity around what is is that you want. Take the task of clarifying what you want your ideal social life to look like as seriously as you would your ideal dating life. What kind of friends do you want? Reliable, fun, and intelligent friends are great to have. What do you want to do with reliable, fun, intelligent friends? Go dancing? Go for a walk? Catch a show? Check out open mics? Make a list, create a vision board, journal; however you do it, figure out what you want your wholes, algorithm-free social life to look, be, feel like.

2. Stop being boring. (Sorry, I don’t make the rules)

Would you want to be your friend?

Boring people bore people, and nobody likes being bored, including you. Boring people don’t do anything. Boring people sit around, scrolling, complaining about how everyone is online and there is nothing to do and nobody to have sex with while the whole world is out there fucking Wait, no, this is isn’t about dating apps. Back to topic: If you are bored, you are boring. SORRY I DON’T MAKE THE RULES. You want to feel better about yourself or you want change that will surprise and delight you? Nobody said this would be easy. If you want change, stop waiting for fun to happen and make fun happen. Don’t be a do-nothing-person. Do something; anything. Once you start going out and doing things, you will find there is a whole world of people out there doing things and enjoying reality. They are even willing to chat with you, connect and invite you to things. If you spend all day on the phone, you wrongly believe everyone else is also in bed scrolling: Confirmation bias. Reality still exists and it is still bustling. The best way to make friends is to commit to your solo adventure. It will change you too; you’ll feel better about yourself and people who feel good about themselves are attractive. Spending all day on Tik Tok will, in contrast, make you feel like crap and you carry that energy around; it is off-putting. (sorryIdontmaketherules)

Google things to do in your city and go out and do things. Simple as. It’s not easy, especially at first, but it beats the alternative and it can lead somewhere far better than years of scrolling. And if you are always doing something, when you meet someone new or your old friend is back in the city and messages you, you will always have something to invite them to. When you meet someone, you can say, dude you would love this bar; I’m going to a show Saturday, I’ll send you the link if you wanna join; There is a live music event Thursday, I’m going with friend, are you free? Also, although most people are also dying to connect with others and make friends, the internet has turned us all into indecisive, uncommitted, distracted assholes. The only thing that works is: “There is this thing happening, at this date, this time, this place. I’m going. Wanna go?” The people that show up and enjoy doing things with you are your kind of people. The more you do this, the more your identity will start to shift. You become the person who is always finding and doing fun and interesting things, and you will began to attract other people who also like to do fun and interesting things. Then, one thing leads to another, and another hangout, invite, and before you know it you have a busy and interesting social life. Be bold, daring, fun.

3. Find (your) people.

Start at home. Literally. Parents, siblings, cousins, neighbours; people in your immediate life can make for good company and social life if you cultivate those relationships bravely and gently. Kids are excellent company if you pay attention to them. If you are thinking “but I don’t like my family, my siblings and I aren’t close, my neighbour is loud and rude,” try the only thing that might save you: love people even if you don’t like them. I love everyone. I understand what it means to be human and I imagine Others are also just trying to make it through existence one day at a time— nothing personal. This has improved all my relationships significantly. Once you have that perspective, it is easier to turn the love you have for people into liking them deeply. When you love people, you will show up with a certain gentleness and kindness that make for better connection and you would be surprised by how well people respond to kindness and gentleness that you might even end up liking them. Of course, avoid the chronically unhappy and unlucky, no matter the relation.

You meet new people everywhere in the real world too; events, activities, meetup groups, the bar, restaurant, grocery store, walking down the street— People are literally everywhere. The problem isn’t lack of people to meet but when you meet them, how do you figure out if they are the kind of someone you want as part of your social life and cultivate the connection? This is why it is very important to know who you are, what you want, and keep an active lifestyle based on who you are and what you want. Then finding people is effortless. You only need to show up and like a moth to light, you will start attracting opportunities and connections to connect with your kind of people. It is truly magical. I believe there is an energy we all carry that makes us attracted to certain people, and certain people attracted to us. If you don’t know who you are and what you want, you will be attracting anyone and everyone into your life and that will lead to heightened frustration due to mismatched energy and interest. Unfair to everyone involved.

4. (Cliché but) You can be whoever you want/ even yourself.

Who are you?

Show up as yourself; always, all ways. When you put on a mask, you attract the wrong kind of people because they are attracted to the mask and not the you behind the mask. If it helps, don’t take the opportunity away from people who would love to have your real self in their company because you are wearing a mask and they can’t find you. The best way I have found to be 100 per cent myself in social situations and with people is to act like a child. What would a child do? is a surprisingly useful tactic in allowing your true self to emerge. You may think your childlike self is annoying and embarrassing, and it could be so act tactfully, but that is also your most curious, funny, and interesting self. This is what makes children a delight to be around: They are deeply themselves, and we all instinctively appreciate and respect that. It is really the performance we learn to put on as we get older that is annoying and off-putting, and keeps you anxious and unpleasant to be around. Who are you when you aren’t performing under a mask? Trust her to come out and play and be delighted by how well she will attract your kind of people into your life.

5. Diversify your fulfillment.

What are friends for?

A wholesome, algorithm-free social life requires more than just a few friends, your partner, or even family. It is the practice of living in community. Our biggest pitfall today is we expect a few people— or, god forbid your poor romantic partner— to fulfill all parts of you, including your interests, needs, desires. This sets everyone up for failure because it is impossible to be everything for one person. Diversify your fulfillment. In fact, all parts of you deserve to feel seen, understood, and explored, but to do so, you need to diversify the people in your life so that you have all kinds of people that see, understand, and help you explore all parts of you. This is especially important if you have interests, desires, and needs that seem opposing on the surface. I am a self-proclaimed nerd and there is nothing I love more than intellectual conversations and debates: I literally can talk for hours. I’m also someone who loves to get dressed, do my makeup and go out dancing. I used to feel frustrated that I had to choose one or the other, that the people around me were either nerds or can party all weekend long— nothing in between. The solution was simple. Instead of wanting this or that friend to satisfy all my needs, I began cultivating all kinds of friendships and connections to allow for diverse opportunities to do all the things I love to do. Some days I’m engrossed in conversations that fulfill my nerdy soul, and other times I’m lost in a sea of bodies and sweat dancing to my favourite Beyonce song.

Lastly, and I am learning this as I go along, cultivating a wholesome, algorithm-free social life is a lifetime practice. After all, we are ever so evolving, growing and changing. Who you are today won’t be who you are tomorrow, and the you tomorrow deserves just as much as the you today the kind of people, experiences, activities that fulfill his diverse needs, desires, and interests. People come and go too— nothing personal. How lucky are we to have the opportunity to meet all kinds of people and get a chance at connecting with and loving another soul throughout our life? Exciting! As you evolve, grow, change throughout your life, you need to constantly reflect on your social life, make sure the people, experiences and activities that make up your social life are aligned with what you want, and commit to the effort necessary to ensure you create the opportunities and show up to cultivate your dream community.

Of all the things time spent offline has done for me, living in community is my best accomplishment. For years, trapped in internet-induced isolation, I considered myself someone who disliked people; the ‘forever alone’ type, the ‘ugh, people suck!’ type— a walking meme. Forgive me, the internet raised me. Luckily, I was young, and as such, free to explore all kinds of socialization that suited my taste. As I got older, however, tweeting ‘people suck’ from the corner of my bed no longer seemed a quirky trait but rather a sad coping mechanism of someone trapped inside internet-sponsored loneliness. That was then. Today, I enjoy a wholesome, algorithm-free social life that is fulfilling, enriching, and full of joy and excitement.