Carrie Callahan

I've been struggling these last few weeks to reconcile the two goals I have for my social media accounts, so I'm splitting them. On one hand, I want to express myself specifically to my friends and family members. I want to write about silly adventures and my publishing successes. I want to post anecdotes and philosophies and other things I find interesting. On the other hand, I also want to write for writers. I want to be able to contribute to writing communities by reviewing resources, offering writing advice (whatever good my advice would do), and encouragement. Instead of doing either of those things, I've been trying to write to some middle ground on this blog. As I've kicked up my social media habits in the last few weeks, my Instagram account has come to look positively schizophrenic. I'm alternating selfies with writing prompts, pictures of my dog with blog posts about writer's block. Who even is that person? So, to maintain my sanity (as much ...

I am not a "digital native," but I am a digital transplant. I only exist online because I put myself here. I've been thinking about this a lot lately, as I've finally made Facebook , Goodreads , and Amazon author pages for myself. Suddenly, I go from observing to existing. I didn't grow up with a digital self - a crafted version of my personality for cyber country. I didn't have consistent access to the Internet until I was twelve, and I didn't have a cell phone until I was 17. It was a Nokia phone with a background of two colors: black and green. You kids might recognize the color scheme from old fashioned calculators and the LCD clocks you find in thrift store bins. These days, if you don't have a digital self then you don't fully exist in the social sphere. The Internet has become its own universe and social media is where we do the things that used to be limited to shopping malls and night clubs: we walk and talk and flash and greet and...

Internet addiction is an open secret in Millenial society. There's no proper count of how many of us suffer from it, though to be fair, suffering is a bit of a rough word. Constant mental stimulation is wonderful in the moment and there's no real biological hangover (that we know). You go online, click things, interact, get that shot of dopamine and move on. But move on to what? More surfing? And there's the problem. I'm an internet addict. I use it to procrastinate, to feel better when I'm down, to stimulate my brain. I'm not alone, but I feel alone. As much as I can wander around on facebook, the bottom line is that I'm not really interacting with people, I'm just pretending to. For example, real talk: how many friends of mine know my favorite color? Favorite genre of fiction? How many even read this blog to answer this question? How many of my "friends" actually even see me (or this link) on their feed? I would bet it's a small percent...