Social Media Cocoons for Personal Growth

In college, a passing sexist comment from a professor in my Computer Science department left me angry and exhausted. I needed there to be an escape from the misogyny hellhole that was sometimes being a woman in an engineering discipline. In an article long since lost to link rot on the internet, I read about building a cocoon, an intentional online space where you could be surrounded with content that would help you learn and grow.

I wondered if maybe Twitter was where I could intentionally start building a cocoon of just other women going through the same thing. I had found some community in the college hackathon space, but those were mostly people who were still at my age and in the same spot as me in my career. I started following a few of the women I met at hackathons, and then I started seeing who they were following.  If there were conferences that I wanted to attend but couldn't, I followed the speakers on Twitter or subscribed to their blog or newsletter.

Then, I treated it like a graph problem. After a while, I had a feed of mostly tech people, who looked like me a heck of a lot more often than they did in my classes and internships. I read blogs, newsletters, and articles they published. Over time, it became a way that scrolling genuinely supplemented my education.

When I tell people about this, I get a lot of the same reactions:

“So… like a scientific journal, basically?”

“So… like an irc channel?”

“So… like a salon?”

Yeah, this idea isn’t new. It’s just in a different form that can (unfortunately) be easily invaded by content that can detract rather than add value to you in this modern age. It takes some work to make sure you're keeping the content for yourself high quality, but it's very worth it.

I also want to point out that this is distinct from building an echo chamber of only opinions that I wanted to hear and that agreed with me. A cocoon was specifically about following accounts that challenged me to grow in the ways I wanted to grow in a healthy way. Humans love to take things to extremes, so let me be clear: this didn’t mean blindly listening to everyone. It meant curating a group of people I intentionally wanted to learn from, for multiple different reasons. It helped me inform my own opinions since it was content I could engage with more critically.

If you opt to try this method of learning, there are a few principles to follow that help.

You don’t need to use social media in the same way everyone else does. Humans are not built for continuous empathy onslaught. It can lead to compassion fatigue that makes you less empathetic.

There were a lot of people with opinions on how you should use social media. This whole newsletter is, in fact, simply just one more opinion. But I won’t take it personally if you use it differently than I do. 

I’ve sometimes read views that claimed that limiting what I consumed on social media was a privilege, and I just don’t think that’s a fair framing of it. It certainly is a privilege to be able to ignore certain issues that don’t affect you directly; I can agree with them on that. But there are a lot of ways to stay informed that aren’t infinite scrolling, constant notifications of breaking news, and autoplay videos of violent or disturbing scenes. I’d counter that part of using your privilege is ensuring that you can inform yourself in a sustainable way. Social media is a powerful tool in many ways, but it can also suck the life out of you to the point of inaction on the very issues you’re using it to stay informed about. So yes, stay informed, but also give your nervous system time to process/recover. 

Share your life outside of the topic.

I enjoy computing, specifically resilient engineering systems. I connect with my network on other topics, too, though. In addition to an engineering manager, I’m a mom, a soccer fan, a dog lover, and a home baker. When I share those parts of my life, it builds rapport with people. I’m a safe person to connect with and share ideas with because we have some of those things in common. It’s why I roll my eyes when people say “just stick to X” because that’s not how relationship building works and it’s not how humans work. They have multiple dimensions to their life and interests. You can choose what’s too personal to share and what’s not, but from the dawn of time human connection was built by sharing vulnerability. I try to share from all parts of my life to the point that I'm comfortable.

Participate!

This isn't just about consuming, it's about participating in a community. One phenomenon that was striking was when I became a new parent. The moms were starting discussions, asking vulnerable questions, and trying to problem solve together even if they didn't know each other yet. The dads often complained that no one talked, but they also didn't start any discussions. Sometimes they even asked to joined the moms groups rather than put effort into their own spaces. There were spaces where that was fine and others where it was defeating the purpose, when they actually just needed encouragement for that first bit of vulnerability.

Someone needs to be vulnerable first to get things started. Recognize that effort by responding and participating. Make sure you're leaving comments, weighing in respectfully, and adding to the conversation with your own topic initiation. It's the only way it all actually works. Lurking at first while you understand the culture and social habits of a group is fine, but eventually you need to speak up, too.

Build people up. Expect nothing in return.

Root for people, even strangers. If you enjoyed reading something that someone wrote or tinkering with something someone built, tell them! Share their work! It feels great to know when your efforts made a difference. They’ll, in turn, give you a bit more trust when you share something that you’re proud of that might have been a vulnerable moment for you.

Protect your growth. 

You have to be your own moderator when it comes to online networks. It’s much easier said than done. I boot accounts that overuse “breaking news,” sensationalist headlines, or that are meant to antagonize. If it’s causing extra stress without action or without building connections, then it’s not serving you. Remember, the key question behind this method comes down to “Is this helping me grow?” If not, get rid of it. 

Prioritize voices that come from bodies that don’t look like yours.

Burst out of your bubble. Do the people you follow all look like you? Look at innate or intrinsic qualities, rather than choices. I can’t choose the color of my skin; I can choose which political party I align with or the career I choose to pursue. I can’t choose the social class I was born into, the first language I learned, or any of a million other traits, but I can choose whether I use vi or emacs, Mac or PC, and coffee or tea. So make sure you’re learning from voices that have different innate experiences than you do.

You don’t owe anyone on social media an immediate response, if at all.

You never owe anyone on social media a response, and especially not an immediate one. If someone is demanding your time in a way that makes you uncomfortable, it’s ok to just not answer. If it feels like a chore, it’s not a good way to network for you. Let it go. Taking breaks when you need them (and even when you don't) is usually a good idea.

You should choose when you engage, not the phone.

Notifications off. This is a key part of being intentional in your consumption. You need to tell the computer when you want to engage, not the other way around. I aggressively block push notifications on my phone.

With people fleeing Twitter and landing on a handful of other apps all fighting to take up the vacuum that Twitter is leaving behind, a lot of online communities fractured. But they’re all budding or strengthening elsewhere and I believe they’ll eventually stabilize. Just start trying them out until you find one that works for you, and surround yourself with people who will make you better, both online and offline. You'll find you organically build yourself a network, and you'll be learning and growing from it.

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