The Albatross of Success: Performance, Exhaustion and Gratitude

BY LISA MARIE BASILE

I wrote this post because I felt I owed the truth to myself and my community — and maybe some of you will recognize yourself in my experiences.

I also wrote this post because I am grateful for the platforms I have and want to sustainably nourish them rather than quit.

Despite feeling gratitude for the fact that I am able to write, I am suffering burn-out. I am exhausted from being “on.” I struggle with reality versus the Internet. And it all stems from my relationship with success, social media, and the pressure to “keep up.” Some of this is my fault. So I’m here to be accountable, and to question why, when we achieve the things we want to achieve, we feel so…lost.

‘Success’ is supposed to look and feel happy, right?

Over the past year, I’ve acknowledged and written about living a slightly more ‘visible’ life and the pitfalls of success and social media — mostly in captions on Facebook or Instagram. I’ve come to realize, with gem-like clarity, that a) I can no longer go on thinking about it without taking action, b) others are going through this, too and c) it means I have an opportunity to rewrite my life. In short, am a volcano waiting to explode and quit if I don’t get a handle on it.

Maybe you write books or articles or create products or edit a magazine or lead a community. Whatever success you have had (not talking strictly about money or fame), I’m talking to the parts of that success that feel complex and too dirty to say aloud. The parts where you have to show up, all the time, literally and figuratively. Because you asked for it.

This isn’t going to be a poetic, profound, or beautiful piece of writing. It’s just going to be me, Lisa Marie Basile, a poet, and author, and the editor-in-chief of Luna Luna, talking to you.

See what happened there? I have gotten so used to saying that I am a poet, an author, an editor — that sometimes, just sometimes, I forget I’m also Lisa. I’m just a human.

But I’m also a dancer. I’m also a Trekkie. I am also someone who will try (and probably enjoy) literally any other food. I am also someone who works out. I am also someone who loves to study languages. I am also a goofball — a huge goofball. I like to wear PJs most of the time. I don’t always dress glamorously, although Instagram may tell you otherwise. I am in a long-term relationship that is very sweet and good. I struggle with anxiety that gets worse every year. I struggle with imposter syndrome. I live with a degenerative disease called Ankylosing Spondylitis (and much of my true joy comes from being a moderator and advocate for health organizations). I have friends from all walks of life, many who aren’t writers. I like everything magical. I like books, even airport thrillers. I am a former foster youth. I am passionate about people being compassionate and generous toward marginalized communities. I have experienced the effects of poverty, addiction, the criminal justice system, and grief.

How do I encapsulate myself?

How can we each bring our fullness to the stage — when we want to?

We focus so closely on our brand & being “on” that we make ourselves smaller.

To the world, I am not many of the things I describe above. To the world, I’m a full-time writer. I’ve written several books of poetry and have two books of nonfiction, both of which you can buy across the globe. So, I’m also an avatar — a digital representation of me. And that fucks with me. A lot.

Much of my time is spent online (which is great because the Internet allows me to earn money and pay my rent and bills). I run Luna Luna (which I lovingly started in 2013) and promote my books and lead discussions in digital communities. I also spend way too much fucking time curating Instagram accounts and being careful with my branding and strategy. I love being a visible person and a writer, but the constant pressure (some imagined, some very real) to be available, to provide insight, to be moral, or to be wise can be daunting. What is in my books is what I have to offer, but I don’t know everything.

Many of us offer services, ideas, works, and creations, but at what point do you become oversaturated with what you do, versus who you are?

When people write to me about needing emotional help or wanting to publish a book because I’ve inspired them, it deeply touches me and it feels like success. Other writers tell me these are the messages that literally keep them going — and it’s true! The issue is, I can’t help everyone. I don’t have the time or energy. I have had to find ways to respond respectfully (but disengage) because I value this aspect of my life.

So what happens when you cannot physically live up to your own ideas of success?

What happens when you and your avatar fail to present the perfect image?

What happens when you can’t reflect your own curation?

We force ourselves to live as multiple avatars — and that can make us feel disconnected

The thing is, our passion and creative projects often grow bigger than us. Many of us feel immense pressure to build them and scale them quickly or to grow their presence via social media — and at a wild rate. This can be exciting, validating, and fun — but we do have to question why we believe we need to make more, do more, be more, grow more, compete for more. Because we live in a digital age, many of us are parsing ourselves out (like Horcruxes!), cutting slivers off for Twitter and Instagram and Facebook and LinkedIn and email and website management and promotional stuff.

What happens to the real person on the other end of the computer? What happens to us when we are so busy being a different version of ourselves everywhere? Do we lose in-real-life connections or a sense of intimacy? Has it become so second nature that we don’t even think about it?

Well, I do think about it and I think it might be making me feel a little lost.

Were we all supposed to be this many things, to this many people, all the time?

Are we supposed to be on the other end of a phone all day?

What happens when we slow down? Does our brand die? Do we risk our success — and is it worth it In the end?

We feel what we make or do or create cannot be really real without all of the ‘stuff’ that comes with something being a ‘success.’ Like social proof. Or connecting with the right people. Or being engaged X amount of times per day or week.

One popular writer I spoke to the other day said to me, “I have to post the right pictures with the right people, to show my popularity or success. And then everything else just sort of sits on my phone, unseen. I feel like I’m not being real.”

And so we get caught up more in the production than the creation. In the facade. And it happens to so many of us. We forget the little things, the mundane stuff.

When I write a book, the book’s life inevitably changes. Its soul changes. My publishers own a piece of the book, and so the book becomes more about its digital presence and its sales than it does the blood and meat of the text — or at least that what it can feel like. As a writer, you know this going into the contract. But that doesn’t mean you don’t experience the weirdness of your creation becoming a commodity.

Like many writers, influencers, leaders, or creators, I spend so much time promoting, connecting the dots, and doing the admin work that an advance or royalties couldn’t begin to cover (and yes, us writers are undervalued and underpaid — if we are paid at all, which is not the fault of most publishers or magazines, but inherent issues of capitalist society).

I spend so much time being on, being sensitive to people’s needs to the point of self-silencing, or repeating, “sorry it took me a while to respond” that I forget to be off. What it feels like to do nothing. To simply breath. To not have 38 emails that must be answered at all times.

I forgot that I am, on most occasions, not always being paid for the extra work that I do as a “literary citizen” and that I have relationships, debts, and chronic illness to manage. I forget that I am allowed to step away and take a break. I think more of us need to find a way to step away when we need to without the endless grief and shame and guilt that has been pounded into us by capitalism. I know this because I’ve talked to other editors who feel they will let everyone down if they take time to care for themselves. Where are we getting these ideas? What is the root?

It has worn me down. I used to write for Luna Luna all the time, for example. Now, it’s a few times a month. And I have decided to be okay with that.

We have to draw critical boundaries — even with the things we love. The performative self is an uncanny valley.

I am — we all are — valuable simply by being alive. The amount of emails, tweets, and posts you send in one day does not determine your intrinsic value.

I have realized that I am allowed to mourn for a loss of simplicity, even though it means getting to do what I love — write.

I have realized that gratitude can exist alongside tiredness.

I have realized that being in love with the creative process of making a book or running a site or spearheading a public project does NOT negate or erase or preclude or make exempt your exhaustion or loneliness or lostness — both in general and to do with the project.

One example: I have talked to so many others writers who have a book and spend all their time pushing it; they then realize that despite the glory of sharing one’s work, there is a darker side: the performance. Catching a glimpse of yourself in the performative space of branding and sales can make you feel empty, soulless and tired. It is the uncanny valley.

But when we have contracts and promises, we have a duty to share our creations and engage with others, which means we each, as individuals, must gauge where the line of authenticity and gratitude and joy becomes performance and resentment and chore. We have to know when our success is holding us back.

Someone recently said to me, “Success made me timid. Once I realized people liked me and trusted me and expected things from me, I started going inward and getting quieter, choosing my words, cutting out parts of myself that I’d share publicly because I didn’t want to run the risk of people not liking me.”

That made me feel sad. Like, stone-in-the-fucking-chest sad. I felt sad because I recognized myself in it. Being a writer or creator means taking on a certain responsibility — to yourself, your community, your platform. It requires care, nourishment, and respect. That cannot be neglected. But sometimes, when you do have the pressure of engagement, you don’t know what will work for or speak to or help everyone. So you freeze. You question yourself. You wonder why you’re there at all.

We have to reevaluate what’s working and what isn’t about our success, our availability, and our day-to-day lives as creators AND humans.

When we have the chance to share our voices, to speak out, to do something beyond ourselves, to make community spaces, to publish a fucking book that people read — we are doing something magical, magnificent, and life-altering. I should know this. I am the first person in my family to go to college — straight out of foster care. I took out thousands of dollars in loans and got a Master’s degree because I thought it’d give me a leg up (it gave me some big opportunities — along with massive debt). I fought CPTSD and extreme trauma to get where I am, so how dare I question it?

Because we each get to reevaluate what is working and what isn’t. When we don’t assess what makes us feel good and true and right, we can never grow or be okay in our own skin.

I have talked to so, so, so many people whose success became a sort of albatross — precisely because it is not always in alignment with what feels right. You can have and lack something at the same time.

I feel like on my way “up,” I forgot to shed some necessary skin. But then I realized that my sense of success is more internal. It’s more about how I feel about myself than, say, follower count.

In the end, I have decided to make a list of things that I personally can do to alleviate some of those pressures and fears:

1. Find gratitude and start from there. It is a privilege to be in the position of questioning what success looks like.

2. Stop letting social media dictate my “brand.” Instead, share more of myself, without fear of it being “off-brand.” If I lose followers, oh well.

3. Nurture hobbies outside of my career path.

4. Stop trying to make everyone like you. Stop worrying you’ll offend someone. Just try your best at being kind — and if it doesn’t cut it, fuck it.

5. Realize that “success” is determined by how you feel about yourself or what you can do for others, not by what you have.

6. There is such thing as too much of a good thing. Realize that rest, silence, and time away is necessary.

This is my confession. I hope it resonates.