The older I get, the more I realize how deeply most people move as part of a herd. Not because they are incapable of thinking, but because thinking independently requires discomfort, responsibility, and self awareness. Throughout my life on this planet, people have always questioned me. My ways, my reasoning, my stubbornness, my refusal to follow the script. For most of my life, I paid that no mind. That changed about seven or eight years ago when something clicked and I woke up.
That awakening was not spiritual in the romantic sense. It was observational. People started revealing who they truly were. The world felt louder, more chaotic, more fragile. The lens I once viewed life through, filled with optimism, color, and innocence, cracked. Suddenly I could see the storms behind the sunshine. If that metaphor resonates with you, you are probably already questioning the world around you. If it does not, you may still be comfortably grazing.
Which brings me to sheep and the internet.
The internet is a strange thing. It does not physically exist, yet humans have handed it control over their emotions, self worth, and sense of reality. A non place that somehow dictates how people feel about their bodies, their success, their relationships, and their value. It has contributed to depression, insecurity, stagnation, performative compassion, and emotional burnout. And most people rarely stop to ask why.
As someone deeply involved in technology, I have always been fascinated by how systems work. That curiosity helped me understand something early on. The internet is not reality. It is a tool. A constructed environment designed to capture attention, provoke emotion, and influence behavior. Once you understand that, you can begin to protect yourself from its side effects. That understanding allowed me to balance creativity with business. It helped me separate who I am from what I consume. My real life exists offline. When I go online, I go with intention. I am not there to live. I am there to use a system and then return to myself.
That is why the title matters. It’s the internet. It’s supposed to be fake.
Most people do not grasp this. If they did, they would recognize that nearly everything built on these platforms is engineered to elicit a response. Joy, envy, anger, hope, fear, distraction. Whether it is to sell you something, convince you of something, or make you compare yourself to something. It is psychological manipulation disguised as connection. And it works.
We now live inside a digital ecosystem where people allow what they see on a screen to shape their identity and reality. That should terrify us. Humans need clarity between what is real and what is constructed. Instead, we have been conditioned to assign meaning, value, and truth to a place that was never meant to hold those things.
The irony is that people like me use the internet deliberately. I use it for resources, business, communication, and occasional expression. I do not rely on it for validation or belonging. That discipline comes with a cost. When I disappear from the internet, people assume the worst. Silence is treated like a crisis. Absence becomes a narrative.
I have not posted in over two and a half months. I am sure assumptions have been made. In reality, I am simply living. I was born in a time before the internet existed, and that is one of my greatest strengths. I know how to be present. I know how to walk without documenting it. I know how to create without performing. I write scripts, make art, shoot films, conduct business, mentor people through one on one creative direction sessions, host workshops in my studio. A real studio. A real place. A place that does not exist online.
That is where I find peace.
And from that place, I feel a responsibility to speak honestly. The world is not in a good state right now. We are more divided, disconnected, and distracted than ever. Yet we spend most of our time online arguing, consuming, and reacting. We should be in person building communities. Having hard conversations. Creating strategies to repair what is broken in this world.
Whether people want to admit it or not, we are in the middle of a civil war of values and identity. We are in a global conflict that will never be announced through a notification or a headline saying we are at war. We are at war with ourselves. This was said years ago by artists Mr. West, who was dismissed as unstable or crazy. History has a pattern of doing that.
Neurodivergent thinkers are often labeled insane until their ideas become undeniable. Majority rule has taught us that truth requires consensus. It does not. Most of what matters begins with one person standing alone long before others catch up. What I have learned is simple. I cannot control the world. Most days, I can barely control myself. What I can control is how I show up. I stand firmly in my morals. I stand firmly in how I treat people. I stand firmly in my refusal to sacrifice humanity for approval. If that costs me friendships or relationships, so be it. I would rather be aligned than accepted.
All we truly have left is ourselves and the reality we actively choose to live in.
So let me land this.
If you made it this far, understand this. The internet is not a real place. It is artificial by design. That does not mean you should avoid it completely. If you are an artist, a creator, a founder, a director, or someone trying to build something meaningful, it is your responsibility to use the stage wisely. Write your narrative. Put on your show. Move strategically. Extract what you need and return to real life.
I will say it again. It is your job to write and perform your own story so you can go where you want to go. But that journey requires awareness, discipline, and self trust.
Because the internet is not real.
And while people say fake it until you make it, I say something different.
Fake it until you are it.
Hope this helps.
-B
Leave a Reply