i didn't quit the internet. i just quit auditioning for it
A note on tech minimalism
I was taught to overwork.
To dream big. To grind hard.
To bleed for a future that looked nothing like me.
If I rested, I felt guilty.
If I didn’t get perfect grades, I felt dumb.
If I didn’t trend, I felt invisible.
If I didn’t perform, I felt unlovable.
And it only got worse when the internet got louder than my own head.
Social media became the new static—
a slot machine of strangers arguing for attention
over things they won’t care about five scrolls from now.
We went from tuning into shows to becoming content for each other.
We traded presence for presence indicators.
I used to have a relationship with art.
I picked out the CD. I held the DVD. I remembered the names.
Now? I don’t remember the artist I listened to this morning.
And I am one.
We don’t have relationships with content anymore.
We consume it like fast food, served by algorithms
designed to keep us hungry, not nourished.
So I’ve been stepping back.
-I keep a private YouTube account, but I don’t post.
-I host my digital relics on Substack—quiet, intentional.
-I use a Strawpage for my public links and resume.
-My company might post someday, but not me—not right now.
-I avoid Google and Amazon when I can. I shop from smaller, weirder corners of the web.
-I don’t chase the noise. I’m not trying to win the algorithm anymore.
I think the culture might eventually stabilize.
There might be a future where online feels human again.
But that time isn’t now.
And in the meantime, I’m not going to act like the world isn’t addicted to its screens.
Everyone tells each other to “touch grass”
as if we’re not all afraid to look up.
Truth is—I’d buy an iPod tomorrow if Apple brought it back.
No ads. No notifications. No dopamine traps.
Just the music. Like it used to be.
Vinyl outlived the iPod. Think about that.
We’re not nostalgic for the gear.
We’re nostalgic for the way it felt to connect with art
before the machines started rating us in real time.
Sometimes I wonder if it’s our fault—
Millennials.
The first digital natives.
The burnout generation.
I don’t know.
Maybe I was never meant to trend.
Maybe I was never meant to be properly understood.
But I am meant to leave something behind.
Something real. Something cool.
Something that doesn’t care about reach,
but still knows how to reach you.
Offline, I live different.
You’ll catch me at jazz bars. At the movies.
At the opera. In bookstores. At the park.
Not because it’s aesthetic.
Because it breathes.
At home, I burn incense.
I let vinyls spin.
I write lyrics.
I read.
I breathe.
That’s how I know God’s real.
Because somehow I’m still here.
And I never fit the mold.
And I’m better for it.
—C.H.