Trending on TikTok this week, is bedazzling. Bedazzling is nothing new, in fact you might remember a time last year where people were bedazzling their skincare products as an offline activity. There is so much wrong with the bedazzling trend, of course it’s bad for the environment but those little rhinestones also don’t last diva. We all know, from childhood, that there is nothing worse than when inevitably those rhinestones start to fall off one by one. It looks so dreadful that you begin to rip them all off, only to be left with glue staining whatever you’ve bedazzled. I thought the internet would have learnt a thing or two from that era last year.

Oh, it seems they actually did. Instead of bedazzling something that you consistently use, why not bedazzle something single use?? I don’t know, like, maybe, a plastic coffee cup? Or a sheet mask???

Do I live in some parallel universe? Did these people not also just live through the hottest summer we’ve ever had? Have they not seen the scorched grass that hasn’t seen any rain for months? I ruined my entire day researching this content. It was one of those things where you stare in disbelief, you scroll and scroll and get increasingly more anxious because there are so so so many people doing this trend, seemingly without a second thought. The comment sections give you no hope in humanity either, it’s just filled with ‘what a cute idea’ or ‘so whimsy’.

I normally take a moment before I start to judge these people. I give them the benefit of the doubt, see if it really is that deep, ya know? I couldn’t find a single reason for doing this. Bedazzling brings me joy too okay, I LIVE for a sticker and have stickers all over my laptop, my journal and my work diary. I’m even willing to let the bedazzling of Stanleys go, but SHEET MASKS? Have we lost our fucking minds? Sheet masks are basically just plastic that you put on your face in the name of self care and then chuck in the bin, so that it can live on, in the oceans or landfill for hundreds and hundreds of years. Most sheet masks stay on your face for maybe 5 minutes, 10 minutes at a push. They pollute our planet for centuries after.

Putting rhinestones on something that you can’t even see because it’s on your fucking face, is the most self absorbed thing I’ve seen in a very long. I’m writing this from an angry place, I know that but I also think I’ll still be this enraged next week, and the month after? I don’t think anyone with common sense or a slither of climate awareness can look at this and think ‘yeah go for it’.

The funniest thing is that people are calling this whimsy. There is nothing whimsical about creating waste for the sole purpose of taking a video or photo and sharing it on the internet. That is actually the complete opposite of doing something whimsical. Maybe if people just did it with their chest I’d be slightly less pissed off. Just say ‘listen guys I actually don’t give a shit about the planet and all that, nor am I doing this to be whimsical, I just want to hop on the trend and take a cute video of myself and my stupid sheet mask so that I can post it online and get attention for it’. Don’t hid behind whimsy!!!

‘Go after cruise ships’ someone commented on my reel about this ghastly trend. You know what diva, I actually do! Do you?? We are actually allowed to go after cruise ships, big oil, ai AND these stupid little sheet masks. If we allow trends like this to happen, it only breeds more people who don’t give a shit, who are even more out of touch. Then whose gonna go after the big dawgs? Oh yeah, the people who spoke out against the bedazzled sheet mask trend in the first place. It is so easy to not bedazzle a sheet mask. I promise, it only takes a little bit of self restraint. Maybe bedazzle, I don’t know, anything else? Put some gems on your mirror or your diary or your jewellery box, if they really bring you so much joy.

Anyway that’s enough rage-typing I reckon. Thank you for bearing with me. I don’t have any answers or conclusions to this but I hope, for everyone’s sake that we, as a society, can stop letting things like this be socially acceptable. It’s disgusting right? Or am I the one losing the plot?

Towards the end of last year, I made a post that read ‘criticising influencers isn’t very girls girl of you’. I went on the say that actually, I do this work because at the root of it all, I am a girls girl - just not in the pinkwashing way.

In the post, I asked people to consider the girls who are being treated poorly, in the factories of the fast fashion brands that influencers are promoting as well as the women and girls left to pick up and shift through our textile waste washing up on their shores. What of the girls living through war or the girls that come next and are left to deal with the devastating effects of climate change that we contributed to? What about the young girls who are comparing themselves to the unrealistic beauty standards the online world is portraying? I ended the post by saying that you don’t get to weaponise feminism when it works for you. Influencers don’t get to say ‘girls supporting girls’ when it only includes girls that look like them.

I reposted a similar version of that post in the wake of the NO INFLUENCERS sign going viral (photo via Instagram / Four Winds Crafts Guild), which sparked the video I alluded to earlier. You can scroll through my post here. Influencing is a female dominated industry, which is great, until it means all valid criticism is considered ‘a socially acceptable way to hate on women’.

‘I want to be an influencer’ is how I started a reel that went pretty viral last year. I don’t want to influence you to buy things you don’t need or all the stuff I get for free. I want to influence you to think more critically when you engage with media online. I want to influence you to spend more time outside than you do on a screen. I could go on but the bottom line is that I believe having ‘influence’ is not just a great opportunity, it’s a massive responsibility, one I will never take lightly.

Influencer’s build their careers from the support and adoration of their followers. They build trust, people are invested in their lives and hold them in a high regard, in some way or the other. They intentionally create a para-social relationship so people want to keep up with their lives, and ultimately buy what they’re selling. I don’t think all influencers do this obviously, or at least don’t start out this way but influencer money is BIG money, and a lot of people I have learn’t, have a price. I think it is because of the immense earning potential in this industry, that the ‘culture’ has become what it is today.

Running creators used to share their tips and tricks, warm up ideas or maybe a very raw and real insight into their training for certain races. Today, we’ve seen an increase in ‘runfluencers’ who merely post their aesthetic running fits, normally different for every run. There’s nothing wrong with the latter by the way (besides the extreme overconsumption), it just shows how the landscape is changing and how, more than ever, we’re almost always being sold something.

This is where I get a wee bit angry. I’ve been in this industry for about a year and half. I’ve gone to events and I’ve even been on a PR trip (more on this another time). I know what’s happening behind the scenes. I know people are editing their photos, I know people are lying about the quality of items or the benefits of products. I also know that even if some influencers aren’t intentionally trying to mislead you, they’re probably unconsciously pushing a lifestyle that isn’t realistic or sustainable. If they aren’t consistently reminding their followers that their lives are not normal (i.e getting gifted so much excess clothing, owning multiple running trainers, going away as often as they do) their audience will start to compare themselves.

The influencer industry lacks transparency, because breaking the 4th wall is not good for business. You don’t want to #GIFTED because then it reminds people to not compare themselves and if they know it’s not worth comparing and therefore not worth their time aspiring to be you, they probably won’t feel the urge to buy whatever you have (read: got for free).

There are of course people who take it a step further and flat out lie to the audience that trusts them. This is the reason I would urge people to be cynical when it comes influencers, sorry not sorry. We are all living through a cost of living crisis, no one should be telling you to ‘run don’t walk’ to buy something that they got for free.

Haul culture actually disgusts me and the fact that it’s been so normalised online sends me into existential crisis. Influencers posing with big bags of clothes that they’ll hardly wear is a funny way of saying they don’t care about the planet, or the mental health of their followers, who will literally put themselves out financially in an attempt to live the same lifestyle as them albeit on a salary 5 tax brackets below them.

I won’t spend too much time on how influencers often go quiet on political matters in order to remain ‘brand friendly’ because I know people feel strongly about this. My take is quite simple: you vote with your money and I wouldn’t want to put my money (or a follow in this case) into the pocket of someone who would maybe vote against my right to abortion for example. Idk I really think it is that deep?

There’s no convincing me that the influencer industry isn’t doing insane environmental damage. I won’t derail this very important point by spending too much time on how, yes of course the corporations and billionaires are the ones causing the most amount of damage and we should absolutely keep signing petitions and getting involved in any way we can so that they can’t get away with it. That doesn’t mean I can’t ask influencers to do better. We all have important roles to play.

As a consumer or follower, you need to think critically when you engage with media online. By all means, fangirl, be inspired, have big goals and dreams (I do too!!) but you don’t need to buy more and more shit to do any of that. You are partly responsible for what you perceive to be ‘normal’ because you curate your feed, you choose to spend hours online and you maybe follow too many of the same kind of influencer. You need to become harder to influence (I’ll talk more about this soon).

Anyway let me wrap this up, I’m not anti influencer. I think influencers can be some of the most wonderful, creative, funny, compassionate and smart people. I personally know influencers that add incredible value, that help and inspire so many people. I have seen people use their platforms for good, to change peoples entire lives. Social media can be so so so good. I think when we use it right, it is a fabulous tool.

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Social media changes peoples lives. It gives people agency. It gives people independence and opportunity that they otherwise would not have achieved through more conventional avenues. I am an optimist at heart, believe it or not, and I love to think that most people get into this world with good intentions. It is unfortunately the nature of the beast (cough, capitalism) that they, at some point, will be tempted to give a little bit of their soul up for the right deal. I’m just wracking my brain on how we can try to prevent this, for everyones sake. There has to be better practices than this.

I think that is why everyone was annoyed by the ‘hating influencers is hating women’ video. It derailed important conversations that must be had. The industry is still so new and therefore so unregulated in so many ways. We want everyone in the industry to thrive, but ethically, right? We want women to be successful, but not at the expense of young girls self esteem. I want influencers to be financially secure, but not by misleading other vulnerable women. If you were someone who truly did care about women, wouldn’t you also be interested in having the hard discussions and receiving constructive feedback so that you could prevent doing harm to all women.

Many influencers don’t share my sentiments and they are the reason I’m anti influencer culture. They are probably the ones doing the hauls and selling their gifted stuff on Vinted. They are the ones lying about skincare results when it was really botox. They are the ones filming in public with no regard for other people’s privacy.

They’re the ones ruining it for everyone.

What do you think?

There is nothing groundbreaking about this content, except from the fact that it is not what we are used to seeing online. Our feeds are more likely full of hauls, shopping hauls, back to school hauls, halloween haul, target haul, holiday haul, anything you can imagine, someone on the internet has mass bought, and opened online for views. This content does really well because for the most part, it is really shocking to us. It’s 10 full shopping bags, it’s multiple pieces of clothing, it’s so much stuff and so much money, more than you or I probably have disposable.

I think the algorithm also pushes this kind of content because there’s normally many linkable items. What do I mean when I say ‘linkable’ - well I think it’s fair to say that social media is now a place where we are sold things. We can’t escape the ads, either from brands that are paying to appear on our feeds, or from influencers we follow, who are paid by brands to create organic feeling content including their products. Then there are videos people are making that aren’t legally deemed as ads because no one is directly paying them to create them. They position them more as ‘recommendations’ and can either directly link the products through TikTok shop or ask you to comment X in order to have the links sent directly to you.

This content gets pushed because the platforms make money and the nature of the ‘comment below’ strategy means more engagement.

We have also seen many people, sharing their walk in wardrobes that look that clothing stores. We have ‘runfluencers’ sharing their insane shoe rotation. There are people flaunting their beauty collection, and most recently we’ve seen the rise of hygiene creators showing off their extensive collection of soaps, sprays and shampoos.

This is what we call overconsumption. Overconsumption is buying more than we need or will ever be able to use. It’s having workout sets in every possible colour. It’s buying water bottle after water bottle as if they were single use. It’s participating in all and any microtrends - buying things because they’re trending and discarding them when they no longer are.

I’m sure we all, in some way or the other, are over consuming. I know when I look at my wardrobe I feel overwhelmed and I don’t even buy things first hand. It still feels like too much. There are definitely pieces in there I don’t wear nearly enough.

Most of these consumerist behaviours are normalised because of social media. We think everyone owns this much, buys this much and keeps up with the trends. That’s why underconsumption or low consumption core was so refreshing to see. It was a reminder that many people lived similarly to us.

I have a problem with ‘underconsumption core’ being a ‘trend’ for 2 reasons.

1. Trends come and go and I really don’t want this to be just a trend, that people hop on to reach new audiences and stay relevant. I think it’s so important that we see content like this to help us snap out of it and remember what a normal life looks like. It helps us feel more content with what we have and less like we need to chase these unrealistic lifestyles. We waste so much of our precious time comparing ourselves and our lives to others, especially on social media, when our ‘boring’ lives are still so wonderful and filled with many good things.

2. My second issue is that for majority of the world, underconsumption is not a trend - it is how they live. We are in a cost of living crisis. Most people are actually living within or below their means. You don’t have to be rich to over consume but it definitely helps. It means that you can quickly find some things in your home that are used up, maybe some ‘scuffed’ shoes or something roughed up from having for a few years, sharing them in a video, but being able to jump on the next trend without question. Underconsumption core is only a trend if you’re rich.

The question also remains- what is a normal amount of consumption? Are the trending videos not just showing us how we should all be living? The Global Footprint network do a great job at putting our consumption into perspective. This year’s Earth Overshoot Day fell on July 30, the date when humanity’s demand on nature exceeds what Earth’s ecosystems can regenerate in that year. According to Global Footprint Network, Humanity is currently using nature 73% faster than ecosystems can regenerate, the equivalent of living off 1.73 Earths.

Now I’m sure it’s obvious that we don’t have 1.73 earths to live off, and most people aren’t living like we do. Many countries are using far less than the earth can regenerate and it is normally wealthier economies and countries doing the over-consuming for everyone. For example, if everyone on the planet lived like US Americans, we would need 5.1 Earths to sustain us.

I know that people use words like under or low consumption because they were more eye-catching and attention grabbing and not because it is an accurate term. It feels more like a direct response to overconsumption, than perhaps ‘normal consumption’ would have been. I created ‘normal person core’ as an experiment and was pleasantly surprised that it still landed.

I think it shows how we are all sick of feeling like we’re not doing enough, that our homes aren’t styled enough, that our routines aren’t optimised enough and our hobbies aren’t cute enough etc etc.

Social media has warped our normal and it’s our responsibility to shift it back. For our own mental health but also for the environment. Overconsumption isn’t just awful for the planet, it’s really bad for us mentally and financially.

The whole point of micro-trends is that they do not last long, we will never be able to keep up. There will always be a newer, shinier version of something. There is an infinite amount of things out there for us to consume and over-consume, and doing this, whether it be to try and fit in or for the cheap dopamine hits, is expensive.

It’s not good for your mental health, to always be looking for where you can improve and upgrade. It will only leave you feeling unfulfilled and dissatisfied with your current life. Ultimately, overconsumption doesn’t benefit anyone, we all lose in some way or the other. Even big dogs who head up the corporations that make millions, will also have to live with the environmental consequences of overconsumption, in their lifetime.

So what we can do? How do we ensure that our normal isn’t completely warped by what we see online? We are partially responsible for what we perceive to be normal. If you only follow running influencers who run insanely fast times, you’ll think that’s the average pace. If you only follow people with drawers full of makeup, you’ll begin to think you should have the same. If everyone on your fyp has a gorgeous kitchen that’s always picture perfect, you’ll begin to feel behind. You need press unfollow more, be ruthless, especially if watching their content makes you feel dissatisfied with your life.

And lastly, follow more people who remind you what a normal lifestyle looks. Accounts that remind you what a responsible consumer looks like and people who encourage you to rather spend your hard earned money on experiences and making memories rather than just more things.

What is a deconstructed latte you may rightfully ask? And how did such a thing become a trend?

The deconstructed latte first found itself online when an LA cafe came up with the idea to deliver their lattes in separate cups for each component so that the drinks wouldn’t arrive at the customers’ homes diluted (god forbid!). The customer would then assemble the latte in their own home. Of course, someone filmed themselves opening their Uber Eats bag, revealing the many single use containers and continued to construct their latte with no visible care or concern, only excitement at the pure ingeniousness of it all. I however, watched on in pure disbelief.

‘I just had to try it for myself’, as all influencers do. TikTok went wild for it and a few big names hopped on the delivery apps to order their very own deconstructed whipped caramel cookie dough cream oat milk latte, or worse still, went in person to the cafes offering such a service and asked for it deconstructed, so that they could open their camera and tell us all how little they care for the environment we all share. Well not in those words…

This is a literal quotation from a TikTok video. I can’t even imagine how out of touch someone has to be to 1) say something like that and 2) go through the edit and posting process and still feel like it was something they were comfortable posting online. In this economy?? Of course the worse option is that they literally don’t even care and maybe, as evil as Satan herself, thought it would be even more viral if she said that on camera. Are there not limits to this shit? Am I going crazy or is it really not that deep?

I won’t spend too much time on the fact that this all happened because we live in a society where it is deemed okay to order a drink to your home. I love a coffee shop cappachichi as much as the next person, maybe even more if it has chocolate and cinnamon on top of it, however I don’t think my want, my desire to be caffeinated by one specific chain, constitutes and justifies the transportation of the drink from the cafe to my home via a third party. We have lost the plot.

‘We’ve lost the plot’ was actually my singular thought repeating itself as I scrolled and watched these videos, until I read the comments…

Now I don’t condone bullying of any kind, but I was pleasantly surprised at our collective response to this trend. Normally, and frequently, I find myself watching haul videos and overconsumption core (purely for research purposes) and feeling so despondent when reading the comment sections. I think to myself before reading them, “surely people aren’t having this’, and 9 out of 10 times, people are loving it. ‘Where’s X from”, ‘‘Wardrobe of dreams”, “Haul goals”. WHAT

I’m painfully reminded that I do exist within an echo chamber and that there are in fact many (😭) people who exist in the other echo chambers, where overconsumption is aspirational and the climate crisis is a myth. But my faith was somewhat restored when I saw as band together in the comment sections and parodies of this trend.

Once I read through the comments, it made sense why I was struggling to find more videos to use as sources. We scared them off. The commoners, in their masses chased the nobility into hiding. Let them eat cake? Not today.

We also did so with such banter, even when the videos probably evoked within us a deep red rage. I was proud to be the people, and that’s not something I feel often. I have never once come off social media, Tiktok especially and felt anything but confusion at best and despair at worst. I think it is because of how disconnected we are from each other, and real community, that our individual wants and needs become our priority. Financial gain, at any cost. Virality, at any cost.

We are willing to do almost anything to be seen. I’m just glad, for now, a line has been drawn in the sand and many of us are protecting it.

If you type ‘granola girl’ into google you’ll be met with outfit inspo, hiking poses for cool girls to try and a fair few Dolomites itineraries. Basically, many different links and discount codes that allow you to buy your way into being considered a granola girl. As with anything trending, being a granola girl was a thing long before it came an aesthetic.

There is no exact definition for being a granola girl but it was previously characterised by being a lover of the outdoors. It was people who were eco-conscious, down to earth and less concerned about adhering to beauty standards and rather embraced their ‘natural beauty’.

They were ‘crunchy’. Being outdoors should be one of the most accessible things for anyone to do but now it’s been co-opted by capitalism and the new dress code is far from affordable.

There is no dress code for the outdoors, besides wearing practical clothing that keeps you warm and protected from nature, if doing anything more than a walk in your local park or beach promenade. Of course this kind of clothing can be expensive because it should be well made and of high quality materials. It can be even more pricey when we choose to support more sustainable, eco-friendly brands who go the extra mile to ensure all the processes within production are ethical and as energy friendly as possible. I’m not talking about these brands when I say how unaffordable gorpcore is.

Gorpcore is trendy. Gorpcore is Arc’teryx and Oakleys. It’s a specific colour ways. It’s baggy trousers from fast fashion brands instead of the not so cute waterproof trousers from the regular dad brands. But like I said, each to their own, Mother Nature doesn’t judge you or your outfit choices. I feel differently about those profiting from being an ‘outdoorsy’ influencer and I’ll tell you why.

People who use their platform to encourage others to get outside and move their bodies? Stunning, no notes.

The paradox lies with those encouraging others to buy and over-consume from brands that are literally destroying the planet. Do I think it’s purposefully malicious? For my sanity I say no.

But do I think people with platforms have a responsibility to check themselves every now and then? Absolutely. They might not even be aware of it, but posting content in this polished aesthetic way can unintentionally create even more of a barrier to entry for those considering going for a coastal walk or small hike. Just as runfluencers do for those wanting to dabble in the jogging scene. People wonder if they’re dressed right, if they’re fast enough, if they’re cool enough. Which is entirely not the point.

I do also think it’s our responsibility and in our best interests, as followers, to critically engage with the media we consume online. We need to realise that often we are being sold to, and in order for them to get us to press the link or checkout, they need to evoke an emotion. If we feel left out, we are more inclined to purchase whatever’s trending. But if we were to just go outside into the real world, we’ll quickly notice that the online trends do not relate to real time offline. It might seem like everyone is keeping up with the trends and hiking in the Dolomites, but in the real world that’s not the case.

The views on your hike will not look any more miraculous if you wear trending shoes.

You get the same endorphins in an old t-shirt.

I have no qualms with granola girl trending, but I would love if it mean’t we were also reminding each other to leave no trace and encouraging followers to buy secondhand when they can. Can we really channel our inner granola girlie and repair instead of replace? Can we prioritise practical kit over looking ‘cute’? Can we learn about the environments we explore? Can we prioritise local travel and tourism?

I know that it is because of the big pay cheque that many influencers can dissociate what they are doing and promoting, with the real life environmental consequences of their actions. I fully understand that everyone is just trying to get by, in an economy that is making it increasingly harder to survive and thrive but since being in and amongst the influencer scene, I know they’re getting paid enough, to say no to the shittiest of brands. Maybe in another article I’ll really get into my feelings about that but I just wanted to make sure I touched on it today because of the genre of influencer culture we’re investigating.

Beauty creators sit inside in front of a ring light and create. They can still create in a heatwave, in a climate crisis. But runfluencers? Where will we have our little mental health runs? The parks aren’t looking very aesthetic. Gorpcore girls? Where we will connect with nature when our fresh air is polluted? It’s funny (not funny though) writing these things almost as warning, as a plea because these things are already happening all around the world, to other populations far away (read: not on our feeds). That doesn’t seem to be enough to stop them promoting Shein, but hopefully the fact that one day it will directly affect them, might do the trick.

In the meantime, we can all play our part to ensure that the outdoors is around for all of us to enjoy for many moons to come. We can start with thrifting as much of our outdoor gear (and all gear) as possible. When we do end up buying something first hand, make sure it’s really considered, so that you wear it for years and years and truly love it. Eat less meat. Don’t use chatgpt. Borrow. Repair. Travel locally. Donate to conservation causes. Support national parks. Pick up litter. Quit fast fashion.

What else would you add to my list?

Since I turned 16 and became fully under the influence of social media fads and trends, I have seen many come and go. I was there for the dark and thick brows, then the fluffy then the bleached. I witnessed people with a gap in between their teeth be used in more advertising and then I watched everyone’s teeth slowly get straighter, and whiter, and whiter. There was composite bonding and then veneers and now influencers are choosing the more natural option of Invisalign. There have been fuller lips and more blushed lips, there have been freckle pens and then blemish free glass skin and now apparently it’s no longer ‘in’ to have fat in your cheeks.

None are better than the other, the trends only change because it is no longer aspirational to have something when it becomes accessible to everyone else.

Once upon a time it was only celebrities who had access to clinics and doctors, so the general public took longer to access the procedures and ultimately much fewer people could actually partake in the trends. Today ‘tweakment’ clinics are on every high street, offering prices that are ‘affordable’. Botox now have a great PR team, turning the once taboo practice normally reserved for desperate(the narrative, not my personal opinion) women in their 40s and 50s, into an expected self-care ritual performed by girls in their 20s to ‘prevent’ needing Botox later in life(?). Someone needs to study the propaganda that took place for us to accept that narrative.

Now the trends swirl much quicker down the funnel from celebrities, to Z list influencers, all the way down to us commoners. Within a few months, the beauty companies have already created ‘new’(read: repackaged) formulas and products that help us participate in whatever tomfoolery is being sold as the ‘goal’. Whilst it irks me that we don’t have enough critical thinking skills to know that chopping, changing and using gimmicky skincare will only make our skin worse, that’s not what I’m too concerned about. Ultimately participating in this way, only wastes our money. Tweakments however, come at a greater cost.

It should not be as easy as it is for us to change our face. It should not be as normalised as it is to cosmetically adjust our features. In another article I will let loose on the anti-aging pressures we feel as women but today I’m merely touching on the pressure to be on ‘trend’. I grew up with bodies being trends, heroine chic/stick thin, pilates arms, Crossfit strong, thick and curvy, lean and long etc etc etc. Faces were manipulated with airbrushing and great make-up but I didn’t feel a strong urge to make my features look like someone else’s. They were just prettier than me and that was that.

I will never, hand on heart, judge a woman for getting Botox. I want you to remember that when I critique tweakment culture. We’re commenting on the societal expectations not the women who adhere to them. The huge problem with tweakments and botox being so normalised online is that the next step after that, is that it becomes expected. We do these things not because we hate our face but because it is so easy to tweak it, that we think we should. There’s no excuses really.

But I’ll give you a really good excuse. Save your money, time and energy because one day, the feature you got tweaked, will be the one people are paying money to have. They will run out of trends, there are only so many ways you can manipulate a face before you find yourself back at square one, a unique and quirky take.

We’ve seen the circular nature of trends many times now, from full glam, all the way back to natural skin. I wouldn’t be surprised if plump cheeks are the look to chase after next, of course only once everyone has already had their buccal fat removed. People dissolve their lip filler when it becomes apparent they’re no longer desirable and if anything, having x amount of ml just shows how behind you are. Those are not my thoughts but that is how society convinces us we will be perceived by others. The lip filler crisis of a few years ago gave us a glimpse into the consequences of treating our bodies and faces like microtrends. People said that the skin of their lips had been stretched and were now loose, making it even harder to not go straight back and get them redone.

What will happen when we’ve manipulated our faces?

Can we ever go back?

Would they really be honest with us if we couldn’t?

I’m not a betting girl but I’d tell you to take a chance on the features you already have. The ones that make you, you. In an ideal world I’d try and persuade you to not even consider what is trending, but that’s just not where we’re at, or will be for quite some time I imagine. So I’m using their own propaganda against them, your face will be trendy, one day. So don’t waste your precious time, energy and money on something you’ll soon enough have to pay even more money, to reverse.

So I ask you, when life inevitably flashes before your eyes, will it be yours? Or will it be the ‘day in the life’ of countless influencers? Will you reminisce about your favourite moments or will you be blurring them with the endless celebrations you watched others enjoy online? It’s similar to when you have to ask yourself, ‘did that happen to me in my dream or in real life?’ Except that in my devastating example you’re actually pondering whether you lived out those moments or just watched so many other people live it, from your couch.

Maybe I don’t need to know a random person’s morning routine, or 9 runfluencers marathon times? Perhaps if I stop watching multiple people’s kitchen renos, my own kitchen will feel good enough again. I suspect that when we stop consuming everyone else’s what-I-eat-in-a-days, that it will feel easier to listen to what our bodies actually need.

The only thing that’s more terrifying than spending all of our precious time watching other people live their lives, is that whilst we do that, we also compare. Our previously wonderfully-ordinary lives become unsatisfactory. We expose ourselves to all that could ‘be better’, and since this is the internet, it turns out everything can be improved. I think that maybe this is the tipping point, when we realise that we aren’t capable of immediately living these exciting and aesthetic lives, the overwhelm paralyses us.

It could never be me, so what’s the point?

I’ll never have it, so I won’t waste my time trying, I’ll waste my time watching.

And before we can snap out of it, our time has come to an end. Not only did we fail to live in the real world, we also spent all our time in the real world unappreciative of the wonders around us. You quickly forget what a privilege it is to have a roof over your head, no matter what the home looks like. You begin to think 5km runs aren’t impressive and that everyone but you, has gorgeous glass skin. You don’t want to hike unless it’s in the Dolomites and you don’t want to gather unless it’s for brunch at an over priced cafe. You miss it all.

Yes, we can aspire to live better, safer and more exciting lives but I think it’s always fair to ask yourself ‘am I really being inspired by this content?’

The Oxford English Dictionary defines inspiration as ‘the process of being mentally stimulated to do or feel something’. You’re not being inspired if the first thing you do, is scroll onwards.