Who Am I Without the Internet?

A year ago, I decided to dismiss myself from Instagram.

I’m being dramatic about this because, at the time, it was a big deal.

I toiled with it. I almost talked myself out of it—coming up with excuses ranging from “I just reconnected with my college roommate, how will I keep up with her now?” to “But how will people know I’m still working for myself?”

My only consolation was that I technically only deleted the app and passwords from my phone. I simply committed to not logging on for the year. If I missed it, I could always go back.

So there I sat, on my couch during that nebulous time between Christmas and New Year's Day when no one is working but they’re also not not working. I hovered over the “delete” button for a few seconds, wondering if this would be the worst or best decision I’ve made in recent years, then threw caution to the wind and clicked.

Before We Get To What Happened Next…Have We Met?

I’m Jamie Cox, brand strategist and founder based in Nashville, TN. I publish content all over the internet, but mostly here on Substack and LinkedIn.

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Finding New People

When I left Instagram, my goal was to make better (read: real) connections with the people I already knew (and meet some new folks in the process). In the 11 years since I’d moved to Nashville, I’d amassed a pile of contacts I called friends but felt more like acquaintances.

Where did they grow up? I couldn’t tell you.

How did they end up here in Nashville? I’m not really sure—I vaguely remember something about a boyfriend?

What were their big dreams and goals? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

But I could tell you their dog’s name, where they got coffee that morning, and all the details of their last vacation.

When the calendar struck January 2, I started thumbing through my mental Rolodex, reaching out to people to say hello and rekindle (or perhaps even start) some of my friendships.

“Hey! How have you been? I’d love to catch up sometime soon.”

“Hi! I hope you’re doing well. You just crossed my mind, and I wanted to let you know I was thinking about you.”

“Hey, I’ll be in your neighborhood next week—do you want to go on a walk?”

I was surprised when I didn’t get all crickets in response. I had some nice text catch-ups with folks and scheduled a few IRL hangs, but all roads continued to lead back to, “I saw you got off Instagram!”

It was all anyone wanted to talk about. And wow, it got old…and quick. 1

When we weren’t talking about my getting off Instagram, folks were trying to fill me in on some new trends, a funny video they’d seen, or some influencer’s life story (if I never have to hear a third-party bio of the Costco Boys again, I’ll be a happy clam).

“Oh, I haven’t seen that.”

“Oh that sounds funny, but I don’t have Instagram so I can’t look at it.” (This is a bit of a white lie but I didn’t want to get sucked back in when I open a link).

Needless to say, some of these relationships fizzled out. We quickly learned we had nothing in common. Our conversations weren’t sparking joy, making me think, or giving me any sort of energy to do whatever *gestures wildly* this was again.

But saying goodbye to some of these relationships left my extroverted heart empty.

I needed more. 

More connection, more people, more, more, more!2 And where can I find that if I’m trying to stay off Instagram?

Finding a New Place

Throughout the first quarter of 2024, I spent a lot of time trying to find a new place on the internet—something that felt essential for both my personal and professional life. I’ve yelled about it before, but working for yourself is incredibly lonely. It’s just not that fun to build a business if I don’t have other people around to celebrate the wins and cry about the losses.

I’m a peak millennial, born in 1991. I grew up in rural Indiana and my dial-up modem connected me to the rest of the world. There’s a hard before the internet and after the internet in my childhood.

I remember when we got a Sattelite television and I was elated I could watch Rugrats at my house and talk to my friend Kayla about it at school. When we got our first home computer with internet, I immediately, at 12 years old, built a GeoCities website honoring my family’s favorite football team—The Ohio State Buckeyes.

My teens revolved around MSN Messenger and AIM. Friends would come to my house and we’d stay up until the late hours of the night, gossiping about the 3-on-3 basketball tournament or catfishing creeps in chatrooms (I’m not proud, but don’t pretend you didn’t do this at least once).

I learned basic HTML because I wanted to customize my Xanga and later my MySpace. Some of my best friends today were in my Top Eight. I’m still shocked when I listen to a song I loved in 2006 and it doesn’t feature the weird 1-second “skip” like the track I downloaded from Limewire.

You get it—I am a person of the internet. And now, I was tasked with finding out who I was if I was if I wasn’t on the internet.

When I started to dig into what purpose the internet served in my life, it all came back to the community. And while you might say, “There’s a community on [insert social platform here],” my Instagram relationships were confined to DMs and group chats.

The connection beyond the digital sphere was missing. My entire being was shaped by the communities I’d joined that were both on- and offline.

My love for punk shows and DIY venues can be traced back to a Totally Michael show in Madison, Indiana—which I heard about on MySpace.

My sense of humor was shaped by the first YouTube videos my friends and I watched (after hours of buffering). I still want a CD wall in my house, inspired by early Smosh videos.

In the summer of 2009, I met a guy at the salad bar and later connected with him on Myspace. Sixteen years later, we’re married and raising two beautiful dogs together.

The magic of the pre-20203 internet I loved was that it existed in real life, too. I wasn’t confined to a 1080 x 1920 graphic but instead lived a 3D existence, surrounded by the people I knew and the people they knew.

It’s no secret that apps are designed to keep us online.4 Platforms profit off of you and your attention. Yes, even that one, and this one too. They aren’t designed to connect us in any way beyond the platform itself.I’m building my new home on the internet—small, curated, and built on mutual exchange. It’s a place where people give as much as they take, where it’s not weird to say, “Hey, want to go on a walk later?” or “Do you want to meet me in Mexico City this February?" (a true story of three friends I know via my new internet home).

I’m disappointed to report I’ll probably never not be a person on the internet. But I’m more aware of its role in my life (and my entire personality).

That means setting reminders to schedule a coffee chat (even if it’s over the phone) and being a touch Type A about keeping track of friends so six months don’t pass without a conversation (I have a spreadsheet—I wish I was joking).

I may be on LinkedIn and Substack, two platforms that I complain about incessantly. But I have yet to return to Instagram. Not yet, and maybe not ever.

Around my year anniversary of removing the app from my phone, I logged on one last time to delete my profile forever.

I didn’t toil like I had previously. The only delay was caused by Meta’s last-ditch effort to keep me scrolling—by burying the “delete account” option in a labyrinth of settings. I didn’t download all my content, which feels a little bit like erasing history and saying “goodbye” to the person I’ve been.

But I’m still here, still connected, and maybe more myself than ever before.