👋 The 5 Stages of Leaving Social Media

Amelia [00:00:01] [Music overlapping with introduction to the episode] Welcome to Off the Grid, a podcast for small business owners who want to leave social media without losing all their clients.

Amelia [00:00:08] I'm Amelia Hruby, writer, speaker, and founder of Softer Sounds podcast studio. On this show, I share stories, strategies, and experiments for growing your business with radical generosity and energetic sovereignty.

Amelia [00:00:22] Download your free Leaving Social Media Toolkit at softersounds.studio/byeig and join us as we do it all off the grid [intro music jams and then fades out].

Amelia [00:00:37] Hello and welcome back to Off the Grid. We are back, baby. I cannot believe it's already Season Two. Or maybe you're thinking to yourself, "Gosh, Amelia, you were gone for a really long time. You're finally back."

Amelia [00:00:51] [Laughs] I hear you. When we finished Season One, I didn't know how long the break was going to be. And then, I just decided that seasons were always going to start in March. So, here we are, Season Two of Off the Grid— Year Two of Off the Grid.

Amelia [00:01:03] I am so excited. If you're new around here, or if perhaps this is your very first episode ever of Off the Grid, thanks for listening.

Amelia [00:01:13] I'm Amelia Hruby. I am the host of this podcast, obviously, and also the founder of Softer Sounds, a podcast studio for entrepreneurs and creatives. In the past few years, I have published a book, I finished my Ph.D. in philosophy, I launched my business, and I left all social media platforms, and here we are.

Amelia [00:01:32] This podcast is about that journey of leaving social media and how I've built a successful almost six-figure business without any social presence. But it's not just about me [laughs lightly]. Because of my past life as a teacher, I am always offering programs, processes, resources, and ideas of how you can support your business and yourself without social media.

Amelia [00:01:54] And I invite on some really amazing guests to talk through their relationships to social and how they run their businesses or side hustles or creative projects or whatever they're up to.

Amelia [00:02:06] So, this season we have so many amazing things coming up. I'm going to tell you about that at the end of the episode. But first, a few reminders— little housekeeping, if you will, as we get into a new season.

Amelia [00:02:19] First things first. If you are listening to this show, you will love the Leaving Social Media Toolkit. It is a totally free resource that I've created to work alongside Off the Grid. It includes my five-step plan for leaving any social platform, my list of 100 Ways to Share Your Work Off Social Media, and a Creative Marketing Ideas Database for organizing your own quarterly marketing experiments. It's a fantastic resource. It pairs so nicely with the first five episodes of the podcast, really, honestly, like, the toolkit and those episodes is a free mini-course in and of itself [laughs lightly].

Amelia [00:02:55] So, if you don't have it already, go download it. It's been downloaded by over 500 people in our first year and I hear from folks all the time who just get— find it so supportive and transformative for their work.

Amelia [00:03:06] So, if you want it, head to softersounds.studio/byeig. That's softersounds dot studio slash b-y-e-i-g. And you can get the toolkit there or just head to the show notes or if you're watching on YouTube below [laughs] and the link's there for you as well.

Amelia [00:03:24] Okay. Next announcement. If you already have the toolkit, but you're not feeling like you yourself can make your biz work without social media, I would love to share with you our self-guided mini-course. So, I created this mini-course. It's called, “Business Success Without Social Media.” It's based on a live workshop series I did last summer. It will be coming back this summer. So, keep your eye out.

Amelia [00:03:48] There are three sections to this workshop essentially. It's Clear the Fear, Weave the Web, and Make the Map, and those three steps guide you through clearing your fears about leaving social media or doing business differently and then identifying the three core areas of your business, which I believe are core offers, core channels, and core community.

Amelia [00:04:07] And then, you get to map your unique business ecosystem to connect your offers, channels, and community. So, I have guided people through this live. I've talked to lots of folks who've done it self-guided, and it's a really both simple, straightforward, and super transformative experience [chuckles]. So, it's both. I love when things can be easy and deeply profound.

Amelia [00:04:30] It's really fantastic. I can't say enough about it, and the folks who've taken it can't say enough about it. And as of right now it is only $44. So, head to the show notes, get yourself this mini-course. It's a really fantastic, easy-to-use resource and it will only be available at this current form and price through the spring. So, it's going to be reimagined this summer. It will probably be more expensive in the future. So, if you're interested, a heads up that it's a great time to get in on that.

Amelia [00:05:01] And finally, two quick podcast announcements before we dive into the episode. Number one, if you have a sec right now, please hit pause and go rate and review the show. Give us some love on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify so that we can refresh our reviews as we head into Season Two. I'd really appreciate it.

Amelia [00:05:19] And number two, this podcast is also on YouTube. I mentioned that briefly before [laughs lightly], but I find that folks are always super excited to find that out. So, if you would like to watch me say everything and all of the magnificent hand gestures I do and even occasionally guest appearances from my cat, you can find all of that on YouTube. You can't get that just from the listening experience. So, head to the show notes for the link and then subscribe to our channel so that you'll get notifications every time we have a new episode.

Amelia [00:05:49] Okay, cool. Announcements accomplished. Let's get into today's episode [sound blast transition].

Amelia [00:05:55] So, today's episode is about the five stages of leaving social media. Now, I've been thinking about this since I left social media [laughs]. You know, I was really afraid to leave social media because the only— like all I ever saw was people say like, "Oh, I got off the platforms and then I would just— had like withdrawal. And I was like, so stressed and so panicked and like, I— I just was, like, trying to scroll anything I could." And that, like, sounded really not fun, so really disincentivized me to ever try to step away from social media.

Amelia [00:06:26] But when I finally left, that actually wasn't my experience. And I had a conversation with a really amazing coach named Joi a few episodes ago or last fall on the podcast. And in that episode, we talked about her journey leaving social media and how much this podcast helped her reframe what was possible for her business without Instagram so that by the time she left, she was just like really excited and in a great place, and her leaving experience was awesome [laughs lightly].

Amelia [00:06:54] So, I've been thinking about her experience, my experience, how similar our journeys off the platforms were, and then also comparing how Joi was feeling just a few months after leaving social media because I talked to her like two months after that and how I'm feeling now, almost two years since I left social media and there have been a lot of shifts over that time. I mean, I was on social for— gosh, a decade.

Amelia [00:07:21] And so, you know, it takes a [laughs]— like, I feel like I'm in this detox process, continues to take time, it continues to unfold. And so, I wanted to walk through that.

Amelia [00:07:31] I, kind of, identified five stages of the experience so far, and I wanted to share them with you. So, let's talk about the five stages [chuckles] and I'll give you a heads up that there are, like, the five stages before the five stages. Got to love nested stage framework [giggles].

Amelia [00:07:48] To begin, I think for many of us here, if you're listening to this podcast, I'm assuming you're, kind of, part of this crew of people who have left social media or want to leave social media or feel really, like, you have to be there and you don't know how to deal with it or like you've never wanted to be there even when you were [laughs].

Amelia [00:08:07] And, I think, for many of us, before we get to the five stages of leaving, we actually go through the five stages of grief first, because we're grieving the dreams that we had for our social presence or for what our social presence would bring our business. We're grieving all the effort we put in and, like, stepping away from this place where we worked really hard and tried to build a beautiful community, or even if we didn't do that work, we're grieving the idea of what we thought would happen for us there. We're grieving the death of that— that dream that I talked about, like, the myth that we were fed, that we bought into when we made our social platforms or when we got on Instagram or when we got on TikTok. Like, we— we have to grieve those things.

Amelia [00:08:50] So, I want to acknowledge that and walk us through, like, how that can feel as it's happening. So, I'm relying here on the five stages of grief— pretty common framework. The five stages of grief are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.

Amelia [00:09:07] This is not my framework [laughs softly], just pulling it from psychology and sociology. So, when we're realizing we want to leave social media, I think we start with denial. We deny that we want to leave, and then we deny that we ever could. It's the sort of, like, internal monologue of like, "No way do I actually want to leave this. It would be so much work. I could never leave. My business would never work without this." Deny, deny, deny.

Amelia [00:09:30] Then, we get angry [laughs softly] at the algorithm and sometimes ourselves, but often at the algorithm. So, I think the narrative there is sort of like, "Fuck this. I'm shadow banned. The platforms don't like me. They don't show my posts to anyone. I hate it here, but I have to be here." So, like, we just get angry and deny and angry and deny.

Amelia [00:09:49] Step three, we bargain [laughs softly], we go into this phase where we're like, "Okay, well, I can figure out— I can bargain with the platform, bargain with the algorithm, bargain with my boundaries."

Amelia [00:10:00] And there, I think, the inner monologue goes something like, "Okay, well, if I only post this many times per week and I log off on the weekends and I do, you know, X number of stories and Y number of feed posts or I'm not going to do feed posts anymore, I'm going to make a feed wall and I'm only going to do stories or I am going to do all reels because that seems to be what they like. But shit, now they've, [chuckles] like, deprioritized reels, so now I'm going to do something else." All of this is bargaining, like, bargaining with the platform and bargaining with ourselves for how we can make this manageable for us.

Amelia [00:10:31] Then, stage four— depression hits. Here is the big like, "This sucks. I don't know what to do." Often in this stage, people will, like, temporarily log off. I see a lot of that or step away for a period of time or just generally feel kind of, like, malaise around— like, "Okay, I did all my bargaining. It was working for a while. It's not really working and I don't know what to do again, and that's— really bums me out."

Amelia [00:10:59] And then, stage five— acceptance. Not everybody gets here, obviously. I think— I see a lot of folks— I talk to a lot of folks who kind of move through this, like, denial, anger, bargaining, depression over and over again and cycle through it with social media, but with acceptance— what I think this stage of that as a sort of like, "Okay, this is not working for me. Social media is not for me. I see it. I believe it." And often then what happens is a sort of like, "Well, I don't— I don't know what comes next and I don't know what to do next."

Amelia [00:11:29] And this podcast, I would say, is really for people who are kind of, like, hitting that moment of like, "Okay, it's obvious that this is, like, a mess [laughs softly] and it's not working and I'm not sure what to do. And I need resources to figure out, like, how can I be off social media and still support my creative practice, my writing, my painting, my courses, my business."

Amelia [00:11:52] You know, there are so many of you out there doing amazing things. How can you share your work and potentially, hopefully make money, build a community, grow your audience, without social media?

Amelia [00:12:04] That's where this podcast begins. But to recap, [laughs lightly] I think that there's just the— all the five stages of grief before that. And it's an interesting example or interesting application, I think, of that model because it doesn't necessarily start with a clear loss.

Amelia [00:12:20] I think that it can be really challenging to identify because often we get on social media without knowing really what we wanted from it. And so, then we can't say like, "Oh, well, I'm obviously not getting this," but we still find this discontent. I think we often enter the five stages of grief from a feeling of deep discontent with our experience on a social media platform or our experience making content for a social media platform. And then, from there we move through—

Amelia [00:12:47] Denial— "I can never leave."

Amelia [00:12:49] Anger— "I hate it here."

Amelia [00:12:51] Bargaining— "Well, I'll do x, y, and z so it's okay to stay."

Amelia [00:12:55] Depression— "That's not really working."

Amelia [00:12:57] And acceptance— "Okay, I need to do something else."

Amelia [00:13:01] So, from there, my friends, is where we enter the five stages of leaving social media.

Amelia [00:13:08] Now, I want to be clear that this is not my five-step plan for leaving social media. So, that is a resource, a process that you can get in the free Leaving Social Media Toolkit and work through. It's, like, step-by-step, like, you're going to do this thing, you're going to do this thing, you're going to do this thing. It's very action-oriented.

Amelia [00:13:24] The five stages of leaving social media are emotionally-oriented, like, how we feel and behave through this process. What are we experiencing in our internal landscape as we are going through the steps of acting— of action to leave social media platforms?

Amelia [00:13:42] So, different things, but let's talk about those five stages.

Amelia [00:13:47] Most often it starts with burnout. I think that by the end of grieving our social media presence, we're often exhausted. When I say we here, I'm really talking about myself. But also, all the folks I talk to in this process. I've talked to, gosh, well over 100 people going through this by this stage, just through the courses and workshops and coaching that I've done alongside Off the Grid.

Amelia [00:14:13] And I would say most folks start with burnout. And at this point, they're often still on the platform, like you're there and you're burnt out and the burnout is part of what gets us to leave. Like, we just can't— can't make ourselves make posts, can't make ourselves do stories, like can't make ourselves learn video. Like, it's that sort of burnout where you're just like, "I cannot."

Amelia [00:14:34] [Laughs wearily] And that's where we begin stage one of leaving social media.

Amelia [00:14:39] Once we decide to leave— so then we— then something really different happens [chuckles]. So, once we decide to leave, we often get this, like, renewed burst of energy, right? "I've decided to leave and now I can announce my exit. I'm going to do it. I've got to tell everyone and I make—" now there's, like, a newfound purpose for our social shares— for our posts or whatever they may be.

Amelia [00:15:02] And so, we have this, like, energy to do it. And normally what will often happen is that our post announcing we're leaving will be one of our most engaged with posts of, like, all time. Like, we get excited about making content about leaving and people get excited about that content. I see this all the time. I cannot tell you how many people. I'm like, "Yeah, I announced I was leaving and it just got way more engagement than anything I'd posted all year, all month, all season, whatever." It's true. And I love you and I'm so happy that your post got engagement. But also [chuckles] it's not— I don't know how to be little frank— like, it's not that special. Like, it is a common pattern. And I only emphasize that because I don't want it to suck you back in, right?

Amelia [00:15:49] So, some people see that and they're like, "Okay, well, maybe I could just have this all the time so maybe you need to back off my commitment to leave. Maybe I'm not really going to leave."

Amelia [00:15:57] But, dear listener, leave. [Laughs] If you've announced you're leaving, go ahead and leave. Don't let that engagement suck you back in. People are engaging because they share the sentiment. They wish they had the courage to leave. So, stay brave and step away.

Amelia [00:16:15] This is part of stage two. So, stage two is something that I call a content creation frenzy [laughs]. I need a better name for it, but that's what I got right now.

Amelia [00:16:26] So, it's definitely something I did when I left social media and it came up again in my conversation with Joi, and I'm starting to see it more and more often. So, for Joi and I both, like, we made a lot of content to announce our exit, and then when we left, we had this habit of just, like, we were making content for social media almost every day. So, we just took that to our other platforms.

Amelia [00:16:48] For my experience, when I was leaving, I was making all this content and I told people, I was like, "Get on my newsletter, get on my newsletter, get on my newsletter. That's the only place you're going to hear from me."

Amelia [00:16:55] And then, let me tell you, [laughs] after I left social media, I sent more newsletters the month after I left social media than I probably sent, like, in all of last year. Maybe that's a little bit of an exaggeration, but I think I was sending, like, three a month for the two or three months after I left social.

Amelia [00:17:11] Now it's like one every other month, more likely, for my personal list. But I think that what I noticed is, like, social media gives us this habit of creating a lot of content really quickly and just pushing it out, like create, publish, create, publish, really fast. And we stay in that rhythm often, like we ramp it up in the process of leaving and then we need to do— we need to, like, send it somewhere else. We have all this momentum [chuckles lightly], we've got this habit and we point it in another direction. It's about putting it out there for other people.

Amelia [00:17:48] So, stage one was burnout, the exhaustion that comes when you're finally ready to go. And stage two was content creation frenzy [laughs lightly] of, "Oh my gosh, I got to announce I'm going to leave, I'm going to make so much stuff. Now, I've got this habit. I'm just going to keep making stuff all the time. All the time."

Amelia [00:18:05] But we're going to start moving into stage three here. So, the thing about leaving social is that your content creation is no longer met by immediate engagement and affirmation.

Amelia [00:18:20] So, when you post on social media, we've been trained to post and, like, watch for the likes and the affirmation comes in immediately. We've all been turned into these sorts of, like, content machines and affirmation machines, right? That we're just, like, engaging, engaging, engaging.

Amelia [00:18:35] We've been trained to engage and we've been trained to expect and desire engagement and so on social media there is this real dopamine loop that's happening where we've, like, trained our brains to desire it and expect it and need it and want it. And that's part of what makes it so hard. And we don't get it because we feel so let down by that. All of that's happening and kind of trained into us on social media. But when you're sending newsletters or publishing podcast episodes, you don't get that immediate hit of adrenaline and dopamine like you do when you post on social media, right?

Amelia [00:19:07] Like, you send a newsletter out into the world and it's kind of like crickets or, like, you publish a podcast episode and, like, you're not going to hear anything immediately, right? Or if you're like me, you've, like, scheduled it two weeks out so by the time it goes live, you're like, "Oh shit, I forgot. That's what we're talking about today. Like, today everyone heard me say x, y, z, even though I said a month ago, you know, when I recorded it."

Amelia [00:19:26] So, leaving social media really changes the pace of feedback. And, over time, I found our content creation frenzy slows down because our feedback loops kind of soften and dissolve. Now, I am not a scientist, [laughs] so if I've got all the science wrong here, my apologies, but I think this sentiment will hopefully ring true for folks who have left social.

Amelia [00:19:54] It's like over time we, kind of, unlearn this behavior. You know, our neural pathways change and we're not in that same expectation, that same loop of share, feedback, share, feedback.

Amelia [00:20:06] For me, now it's like shareeeeeeeeee, feeeeeeeeeeedback.

Amelia [00:20:11] [Laughs] Sorry, that was weird, but I think that what I'm trying to point to here is everything [says slowly] slows back down [pauses] and that is where we enter stage three.

Amelia [00:20:21] And I'm calling this one return to human pace. At this point, when I share and receive feedback, it's happening at a pace where my body can process it, my emotions can process it, my nervous system can stay regulated because it's not happening so fast. Like, my sharing takes longer. I let things simmer for longer. I wait longer to share them. By the time I share them, I feel much more, like, confident in them and secure in what I've said and what I am sharing.

Amelia [00:20:53] And then, it takes some time for people to experience and receive that, and the feedback comes in a little slower and I find that it's a little more considered than it ever was on social media. And when we return to human pace, like, the feedback we're getting is often an email or a voice message. It's not just that simple, like, or quick comment, or emojis, and not that those things aren’t beautiful too. I'm just trying to point to the ways that we return to human pace.

Amelia [00:21:22] We move a little slower, we move at a pace that our nervous systems and our emotional, psychological bodies can process the inputs that are coming, the feedback that's coming. And it feels great, in my opinion, like it takes time and it can be stressful and challenging in the experience but I think, over time, we start to find our own unique tempos.

Amelia [00:21:46] So, human pace, I'm not trying to say here is the same for everyone. I'm kind of differentiating a human pace and a technological pace or a social media pace. Each human will have their own human pace, so yours will likely be different than mine. And I think that what's important is that we're finding our own tempo and not the speed and frequency demanded by a platform.

Amelia [00:22:11] Often part of the reason social media feels so uncomfortable is because it's like forcing us to produce and consume at an inhuman pace. And, for some of us, we might be able to ramp up to that a little easier than others.

Amelia [00:22:28] So, like, I feel like I'm a very fast processor. I attribute that to my Gemini Moon in my sixth house. Like, I'm very— like, I work fast and do fast. I don't have a long attention span for it, but I can move quickly. You know, lots of folks can't. You know, if you got a good old-fashioned Taurus prominent chart, you're going to move a little slower. And that's okay. It's beautiful. It's necessary. It's healing. But it can also just feel like you're failing or like something's wrong with you when you're told you need to move at the pace of social media.

Amelia [00:23:05] So, if that feels resonant, you're amazing, you're wonderful. Your pace is just right for you. And I really invite you to make your way through the leaving social media process such that you can actually get back in touch with your pace and affirm it and affirm yourself in that process.

Amelia [00:23:25] Let's recap real quick before we move on to the next two stages.

Amelia [00:23:29] So, stage one is burn out, that moment where you just cannot do anything else on social media.

Amelia [00:23:37] Stage two is content creation frenzy, where you get super pumped about announcing your exit and then create a ton of content around that and afterwards.

Amelia [00:23:48] Stage three is where you return to your human pace and find the tempo, speed, and frequency that works for you for sharing.

Amelia [00:24:00] Then, we enter stage four. You've returned to human pace and what comes next? I'm calling this one the, "I'm loving it" stage [laughs] to steal the slogan from McDonald's. Don't sue me. In the "I'm loving it" stage, this is where you've left social, you've reconnected with yourself, and you are in your lane. Like, in an ideal world which none of us live in, you stay here forever [laughs], right? You're just like, "I'm doing me. It's working great." But also, life happens. Sometimes we are not loving it. No matter what McDonald's tells us.

Amelia [00:24:32] Sometimes business isn't great. Sometimes we're in a tough spot with our personal mental health. Sometimes life is just hard. And so, as much as, you know, this is a stage of leaving social media, I think that it has to recognize, like, that returning to human pace isn't going to resolve all of our problems. Being off social media does not resolve all of your problems. And so, at those moments, you know, of course, I would encourage you to have a nice buffet of self-care and community practices to take care of yourselves.

Amelia [00:25:04] And if it is a business issue, if what's making you not love it is that business isn't great in that moment, that's when I recommend the Leaving Social Media Toolkit. That's when I recommend those Creative Marketing Experiments that are part of the toolkit, especially the ones that focus on direct sales. That's when I recommend the Business Success Without Social Media course, making sure your fundamentals are in a good place. That's the stuff that can, kind of, help get us through those moments, help us really support our business and ourselves in succeeding without social media.

Amelia [00:25:39] I also recommend all those things before you leave social media, so you have a great foundation set up in the process. I've gotten a few emails from folks who are like, "Is this course for me if I don't have a business yet or if I haven't left social media yet?" Like, absolutely. Set yourself up for success.

Amelia [00:25:53] Okay, finally, we're on stage five, so we're headed into one that I really hesitated to write or to share or speak aloud. I'm not sure it's true for everyone. You know, these five stages may not apply to you at all. And this stage five is what I've experienced personally. So, this is a really personal one. Maybe you'll never experience it. That's cool. But I believe in sharing transparently and vulnerably. So, here I am.

Amelia [00:26:24] Now that I'm two years off social media— I left social media two years ago, I stepped away from my personal brand on Instagram and other places. And now that it's been two years, I've started to get a little lonely, both in my— like in business and in my personal life, I noticed over the past year loneliness creeping in, and I noticed just really missing the parasocial relationships that I had through social media.

Amelia [00:26:58] So, when I left social media, I would say, like, a lot of my parasocial network fell away. The friends that I was, you know, in communication with— IRL friends, like beloved people, we all stayed in touch and were really intentional about choosing how we'd stay in touch. And I love my close group of friends.

Amelia [00:27:18] But what I noticed is that, you know, there weren't as many of them, and I missed the connection to, like, a larger group of people who I felt like shared values and interests with me.

Amelia [00:27:32] And I think some of the reason I felt that is I also, in the process of leaving social media, moved locations. So, I moved from, like, my really rich network of gorgeous people in Chicago to be closer to my family in Nebraska. And this is a much different and smaller place. And so, I haven't recreated the same type of community here.

Amelia [00:27:52] You may leave social media and it doesn't impact you because you stay [laughs]— because you don't also move away from all your friends. I like to apparently pile it on to myself.

Amelia [00:28:01] But what I've noticed is that two years off social media, it does take more effort to keep in touch with folks. And I think that's okay. I think that my relationships are way stronger now because I'm putting in the effort than they ever were when I let social media mediate them for me.

Amelia [00:28:19] So, I think that my relationships have really benefited from the folks in them really participating actively instead of just, like, fire reacting to everything [laughs], which, you know, I did, which is great.

Amelia [00:28:30] You know— and I also think that because of the changes that have happened to social media in the past two years since I left, I'm hearing from my friends that, like, they can't even keep up with their friends there either.

Amelia [00:28:40] Like, you know, I think that some of what I'm feeling is a more general cultural shift, of we're all having to reconfigure how we're friends again, coming out of the pandemic, coming out of a period of intensive social media use for so many of us, coming out of a shift from Instagram to TikTok, where Instagram was originally at least about following your friends and TikTok that's, like, never been the premise. It's about looking into strangers lives more than anything, I would say.

Amelia [00:29:10] And so, I think we're all reconfiguring this. We're all figuring out— it out again together. And so, my stage five of the leaving social media process has been cultivating deeper forms of connection.

Amelia [00:29:24] And I figured that out because I was feeling lonely or I've stepped into that because the loneliness started to show up. I think, you know, in the returning to human space and the "I’m loving it" phase, I was just in this like, be— deep, beautiful love affair with myself.

Amelia [00:29:40] And then, not that that faded, but like, you know, I got to the next stage of the relationship with myself and I was like, "Okay, but now I really want to connect with others."

Amelia [00:29:49] And so, I have been figuring out how to do that, both in my personal life and in my professional life. I'm like, "What is being social without social media?" Back to that question yet again.

Amelia [00:30:01] I definitely think I figured out what is marketing without social media marketing. And now I'm figuring out what is social without social media.

Amelia [00:30:09] [Takes a deep breath] So yeah, that's the honest share, I guess, which is like, yes, you can leave social media and everything can be amazing. You can leave social media and it can be hard. Both are true. I think what's most important is, to be honest with yourself in the process and to implement some strategies. That's what I've shared with you in so many of the resources alongside Off the Grid.

Amelia [00:30:30] Like, implement some strategies so that you can succeed. Again, that just, like, bailing and ghosting, I guess it's a strategy but not an effective one [laughs].

Amelia [00:30:40] So, if you've been building a community on social media and you would like to leave, I think that seeing the path ahead by listening to this episode is a great way to kind of set yourself up with the emotional and self-care and community support, you might need to navigate the process.

Amelia [00:30:56] And then, using something like my five-step process for leaving can help you put in place a thoughtful marketing strategy that will just make sure you have a soft place to land away from social instead of, you know, leaving social then like— and then thinking about how you're going to set up another community.

Amelia [00:31:16] You can transition a lot of your community somewhere else that can hold you as you're figuring all of this out.

Amelia [00:31:23] Before I wrap this up and tell you what's coming up this season, there is one more perspective I wanted to share. As I was working on this episode and kind of sitting in this and prepping it and thinking about it, I came across another podcast with someone talking about their experience leaving social media, and that podcast was Bewildered with Martha Beck, and the guest was Elizabeth Gilbert, who's definitely been mentioned on the show before and, like, probably every other podcast that I would ever listen to.

Amelia [00:31:49] But in that episode, which I'll link in the show notes, Elizabeth Gilbert talks about how when she left Instagram, she really went through a period of withdrawal, and this was not my experience so I really wanted to bring it here in case it's something that you feel or you are feeling.

Amelia [00:32:04] So, to quote her from the episode, she says there, and I'm quoting, "When I left, I felt incredibly uncomfortable, lonely, sad, scared, jacked up, agitated, mostly fear for me, anything that I've ever put down, which is the sort of recovery term for like not using it anymore, has come with a period of withdrawal that for me always felt like fear and I felt it. And that's when I knew for me this had become a drug because I was going through the withdrawal of, 'Oh, I don't have my drug, I don't have my comfort.' So, I sat through it and I felt it. I sat there and I felt that the shakiness, the jerkiness of wanting to reach for this thing, I felt the sense of I'm not connected anymore, I'm not relevant anymore. I don't know what's going on anymore in the world. Nobody cares about me. I'll be forgotten. All these deep psychological withdrawals. And then, after a couple of weeks, it settled."

Amelia [00:32:52] So, I want to share that because I do think it's a relatively common or shared experience. Many of us experience that jittery, constantly reaching for the phone-ness during one or more of the stages of leaving social media that I talked about here today. But what I loved in this episode [chuckles], she also reports back, like she made it through all of that in stages one and two, and then some magic happens.

Amelia [00:33:17] So, quoting her again, "After it settled back came my initial factory settings of, 'Oh my God, the world is so beautiful. I'm going to go for a really long walk.' And I had been wanting— I'd been asking my higher powers and my guides and my muses to send me idea for a novel. I'd been asking for two years. For two years, I'd written in my journal almost every day, 'Hey, any time you guys have an idea for me for a novel, I would love one.' And they would write back, 'When we've got an idea for you, you'll be notified.' That was the conversation that I had for two years, and I have enough trust in my creative process to believe I'll be notified. They'll let me know and then I'll do it. I'll do what they tell me. Two weeks after I got off Instagram, the idea came."

Amelia [00:33:57] Beautiful, right? Isn't that so beautiful for her [chuckles]? You know, I'm not— she is not promising and I am not promising that you will have a beautiful novel idea that comes two weeks after you leave Instagram. But I think that the peace of that return to human pace, of that 'I'm loving it stage' is that so much can emerge.

Amelia [00:34:18] And I think that was one of the biggest things I found when I left social media is just when I really got through the first three stages, I had all this clarity around what I desired and how to support myself. And that meant everything. It changed everything for me.

Amelia [00:34:39] And I didn't write a novel, but I did create a business. I did launch this podcast. All of that came through from the clarity of leaving social media and making it through the different stages of this process.

Amelia [00:34:52] So, maybe hearing these five stages helps you see what's coming if you leave and learning that you might be divinely inspired on the other side [chuckles] is the inspiration that you need to make the shift.

Amelia [00:35:03] If so, I'm cheering you on. You got this. And if you're listening to this and you're totally not leaving social media yet or ever, that's cool too. You don't have to [chuckles].

Amelia [00:35:13] I have no personal stake in whether or not you actually exit social media. I'm happy to be here supporting you and thinking about just exploring the idea of how you might market your business or share your work differently.

Amelia [00:35:27] Okay, ya'll, let's wrap up this episode with a really quick share. So, I promised I'd tell you what was coming up on Season Two of Off the Grid. And I do want to give you a little sneak peek. I've got some great stuff planned.

Amelia [00:35:40] So, coming up next week, I will be sharing an episode that I have been thinking of as, "Ten Things I Hate About Content Marketing." [Laughs] So, I'm going to get a little controversial yet brave, and I am going to share some things that really bug me about content marketing in the way that it's touted as a be-all, end-all solution for small business on the Internet.

Amelia [00:36:01] I'm also going to talk to you about why I broke up with Pinterest. After talking so much about it in Season One, I have decided to abandon it for Softer Sounds strategy this year and I'm going to share why. That feels really important.

Amelia [00:36:15] I'm going to walk you through how this podcast makes money for me and my business without a big audience. That's going to be a true powerhouse of an episode, basically going to give you all the strategy of how Off the Grid works and how it's made, at this point, just over eight grand for me over the first season, first year.

Amelia [00:36:36] I've got some great conversations coming up this season. We are finally going to have a conversation about Human Design that I've been promising. I'm going to bring back some of the most popular guests of Season One to talk about systems in our business, to talk about community for small business owners.

Amelia [00:36:53] I am going to talk more about mapping your business ecosystem and clearing fear around leaving social media. There is lots of great stuff coming up and you can always make requests by sending me an email— hi@softersounds.studio is where you can reach me.

Amelia [00:37:10] I'd love to hear from you. Let me know what you'd like to hear on Season Two and I think that's it for today, friends. It's been so nice to be back.

Amelia [00:37:20] There'll be new episodes of Off the Grid every Wednesday through the summer, so got lots of good weeks coming up. Make sure you subscribe in your favorite listening platforms so you don't miss an episode and go download the Leaving Social Media Toolkit. You'll get that free resource and more emails for me about new episodes of the show, special giveaways, lots of fun stuff coming up.

Amelia [00:37:40] So, all of that's at softersounds.studio/off-the-grid or the toolkit's at softersounds.studio/byeig.

Amelia [00:37:46] [Outro music begins to play] Big love to all of you. I'll see you next time. And until then, let's get off the grid.

Amelia [00:38:07] Thanks for listening to Off the Grid. Find links and resources in the show notes and don't forget to grab your free Leaving Social Media Toolkit at softersounds.studio/byeig. That's softersounds dot studio slash b-y-e-i-g.

Amelia [00:38:23] This podcast is a Softer Sounds production. Our music is by Purple Planet and our logo is by n'atelier Studio. If you'd like to make a podcast of your own, we'd love to help.

Amelia [00:38:33] Find more about our services at softersounds.studio. Until next time, we'll see you off the grid [music fades out].