The decision not to share at all, not because it’s private, but because it feels… flat, unremarkable. Like it wouldn’t hold anyone for more than a second.

Nothing about that moment feels dramatic. It’s small. Forgettable. Which is kind of the point.

When presence stopped being enough

No one ever told us we had to be interesting online. There wasn’t a meeting or a rule change. It just slowly became clear that being present wasn’t enough anymore. You had to be legible. Shareable. Slightly polished. You were aware of how something might land even when you were not trying to impress anyone.

The majority of individuals are not actively looking for attention. They have no intention of gaining a following or going viral. However, there is still an underlying understanding that anything you post will be categorised, analysed, and subtly evaluated based on the amount of reaction it receives. And you evolve over time. You discover what is effective. You realise what does not work. You discover which aspects of yourself are easier to assemble.

The pressure is not to be extraordinary. It is to be distinct. To have a tone. A perspective. Something that reads like a personality. Being neutral feels like disappearing. Being quiet feels like falling behind. Even doing nothing can start to feel like a statement you did not mean to make.

So we narrate ourselves. We turn experiences into updates. Thoughts into captions. Feelings into something trimmed down enough to be understood quickly. And eventually it becomes automatic. You are doing it without realising it. You simply notice that certain moments feel unfinished until they are expressed, while others feel strangely empty once they are.

Living with a second layer

There is a subtle shift that happens because of this. You start experiencing things with a second layer attached. Not just this is happening, but this could be something. A photo. A thought. A post. The instinct to document shows up faster than the instinct to sit with what is in front of you. And even when you do not act on it, the thought is still there, always lingering.

What sits underneath all of this is a quiet fear of being forgettable. Online spaces move fast. Attention is brief. Everyone else seems sharper in hindsight, funnier, more articulate, more certain about what they mean. When visibility feels like relevance, being “interesting” starts to feel less like a bonus and more like basic maintenance. As if, without effort, you fade.

The strange thing is how this shapes authenticity. We are encouraged to be ourselves, but only in ways that translate well. Messy thoughts get cleaned up. Complicated feelings get compressed. Even vulnerability becomes something you learn how to present properly. Honest, but not confusing. Personal, but still readable.

It is not fake, exactly. It is filtered. Curated just enough to make sense to people who are not really part of your life.

And perhaps that is why it feels draining in a quiet, hard-to-pin-down way. It is not because you are lying, but because you are aware of yourself all the time. Observing your appearance. Editing in real time. Even when no one is actively watching, you live with an audience in mind.

What never gets shared

I wonder how many things are never communicated because they do not sound like anything. Regular days. Incomplete ideas. Moments that mattered only because you were there for them. Those have no place on the internet, and it is easy to forget they are sufficient on their own after a while.

Resisting this pressure does not have to be dramatic. It can be as small as letting something happen without turning it into an interesting story or post. Letting a thought stay unfinished. Letting a moment pass without proof. Choosing not to make yourself interesting for once.

Being present again

There is something grounding about that. About remembering that not everything needs to be shaped for consumption. Some parts of your life can stay unremarkable, unseen, and still be real.

Maybe being interesting was never the point. Maybe we just forgot that being present was allowed.