I curate my social media content to only show the best of the best from my life.  You see wedding photos from sprawling fields, sweet families laughing together, and newly engaged couples giggling to the point where their noses wrinkle.  You don’t see the stress of bills, the countless turn downs, the 2am editing sessions.  We are used to seeing the filtered lives of others, and yet we don’t even realize it.  It’s so easy to compare ourselves, our real, true, messy, hidden, selves, to the seemingly perfect lives of others.  And it isn’t healthy.  Sometimes I like to look at my Instagram of Facebook because it looks better than I know my real life is.  Owning a Small Business can be very tough on self worth since what we produce is very personal.  If people aren’t booking, it means we are not worthy.

Social Media is a necessary evil for small business owners as a platform for marketing.  But the line between marketing and self worth has begun to blur.  Likes and Shares become personal— your post only gets 100 likes, and someone else has 1000.  That clearly means your work is terrible.  If your work is terrible, you are terrible.  Do you see how dangerous this can become?

Deep down, we all know that multiple factors impact how many followers/likes/shares you get.  The ever changing Algorithm is possibly the most annoying.  Wherein exposure used to be organic, now what we see had been perfectly curated by computers so we see what technology thins we want to see (I searched for baby clothes ONCE for a friend and now every Facebook ad is about pregnancy, babies, and IVF…..Back off Facebook!).  If someone doesn’t like or comment in the first minute, your post won’t have much success.  On Facebook, 5% of my following seeing my post, yet I get a “free” $10 from Facebook to advertise each day (which I do not accept….because I know it’s a can of worms).

So ask yourself…. If you as a Small Business Owner put so much self worth in what you create, and an Algorithm determines the results (for good or bad), how can we create some distance and still feel fulfilled?  I love what I do and I feel fulfillment in what I create—- and I will not deny that it feels amazing when a post gets a positive response!  If I posted something because it was worthy to me, how can it remain that way despite social media feedback?  Keep reading, because I have some tools for you.

1. Before posting, write down the date/post and 3 reasons your post is important to you.  Then, positive, negative, or non-existent feedback, you’ll affirm its importance to yourself.
2. Have a social media Sabbath.  This is incredibly hard!  But I try and avoid social media on Sunday’s.  If you are afraid that this might hurt your business, don’t forget that you can schedule posts through many apps.  Step away from the phone and computer.  If it isn’t on Instagram, it can have happened 🙂
3. Create for yourself and only yourself.  And by that I mean create something and don’t share it on social media at all.  If you’re a painter, paint something and keep it for yourself.  If you’re a photographer, photograph something.  Print it.  Display it in your house.  If you are a baker, craft the most amazing freaking cake ever and eat it all (okay or invite people over to help you eat it).  The point is, you don’t have to share everything you create.  You do not need the approval of strangers to validate your craft.
4. Write down what you are thankful for.  This is huge.  The other day I was writing down some things I was stressed about to get it off my chest.  And in the middle, I stopped and thought, “what am I doing? I should have started by writing what I am thankful for”.  We will always have stresses in our lives. So let’s focus on our blessings.

I have created this simple daily diary you can download which helps to focus your mind on the positives of the day.  You can download your copy here!

Small Business owners, creatives, we are all in this together.  You are worth so much more than your craft, and your craft is more valuable than an Algorithm says.