DISPATCH 009: Lay Down Your Weapons, But Don’t Hide Them
How a social media detox and my first reiki session reacquainted me with silence, solitude, and truth.
My name is Priya Florence Dadlani and I’m an NYC-based cultural worker. I’m infinitely grateful to everyone who has chosen to meet me in this liminal space I often find myself, constantly on the edge of becoming. If you’re able, please consider becoming a paid subscriber to my newsletter, or making a one-time gift to support my storytelling via Venmo @priyafdadlani.
“No one is going to make this easy for you dearie, stop waiting for someone to tell you what the right thing to do is. You’re a smart girl, what do you think?” — Razz, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power
Being myself means that I’m at times indecisive, in the gray areas of life. Unsure whether to break free or double down, jump or sink, give or take. But one thing I am learning is that the universe eventually gets sick of my bullshit and pushes me off the cliff anyways. She holds my eyes wide open when I would rather look away. Takes me to impossible places where my foot shoves down out of instinct, reflex. Some decisions I make are guided out of me, from deep within me, almost as if I had nothing to do with them. As time passes though, I am coming closer and closer in touch with that decisive spirit power. Instead of fearing her grip, I welcome her. Gripping her neck, as she grips mine. I can lock eyes with her and hold a gaze longer than I have before. For a moment we overlap, laying into one another. It looks like me snapping out of my people pleasing trance and saying, “I can’t talk about this now. I’m sorry, bye.” Click. It looks like me counting down from 5 and getting out of my depression nap state at 1 no matter what, as if the world depends on it [it does]. It looks like me stripping the layer of guilt off, balling it up, and throwing it into the fire. Looks like letting an abuser’s world burn down and accessing the real inner-bimbo, walking in the other direction like I didn’t see anything. Looks like telling a lover to stop doing it that way, cause it just doesn’t feel good Do it this way instead. It’s like suddenly pressing, “Publish” in the offbeat of time. In some ways I still wait around for the divine push of life to keep me moving towards the future I desire, but today I beat her to the punch.
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A few weeks ago I was at the beautiful and inspiring Festival of Grounded Souls organized by Divine Times Collective. The day before, I had just come back from a short trip to Miami which unfortunately included flight delay drama, and before that an emotionally chaotic couple of weeks. I wanted to be outside and soak up some sun, but I didn’t want to speak to anyone except a couple besties who I can bear silence with. Admitting this made me feel guilty, but then it hit me that there are people who go outside, attend the party, the festival, the zine-making workshop, and remain quiet. No chit. No chat. Maybe some minor hello’s and a hug here or there, but overall just take in the vibe. Being comfortable in the safety and warmth of their own mind. It’s not that it’s hard for me to shut the fuck up (surprise!). It’s just that sometimes silence scares me. Open, open space. It scares me in the same way the idea of being deep in the forest scares me. In silence, anything can happen. My own stream of consciousness can happen. I think others have come to expect a certain Priya, a certain talkative, bubbly, and social person. While I am a naturally chatty, outgoing spirit who genuinely thrives on connection, I know that sometimes my extroverted tendencies stem from the shadowy place where proactive people-pleasing & vibe management keep me not only safe and in control, but well-liked.
Allowing silence to wash over a moment can also be a brief release of control; it can be trust. Trust in the people around you, and trust in yourself that not every moment must be filled. Silence allows for truth to seep in… the awkward moment of quiet when chatting with someone you have unfinished business with? That silence can be loud as a scream. When I look back, me and silence haven’t gotten along for a while. As a talkative child, silence was often the punishment. As a teen, I loved having music or TV on 24/7. A few years ago I discovered sleep timers on TV, and it was over. I never thought much about my aversion to silence until recently, I just enjoyed having enough going on in the background to keep my mind moving. Coping mechanism turned unhealthy habit? Maybe. And I feel like social media, while not always producing sound, adds another layer of distraction to the mix. Throughout my non-linear healing journey though (aka my truth-telling journey, my resourcing the inner-child journey, my laying baggage down journey, etc.) I have rewritten many of the stories I once told myself. I have rerouted my life. And some of the coping mechanisms I once relied on to protect myself are now useless to me. Like avoiding silence, for example.
Solitude, another state I desperately need yet don’t crave enough, remains even more elusive than silence. I’m rarely really alone. For 18 months in 2021-2022 I lived alone for the first and only time in my life and was perhaps the most creative I have ever been. As someone who doesn't intentionally carve out solo time and loves hanging out, the moments during my mornings and evenings, the moments as I was cleaning or cooking a meal for myself, watching TV, reading, all combined to create so much alone time. A time when a lot of magic happens, magic I wasn’t even aware of. I don’t live alone anymore, and I don’t proactively carve out time for solitude either.
Silence & solitude. Solitude & silence.
In June I took two weeks off work, which included a social media break. I have been active on social media since Myspace days, maybe 7th grade? So for 16 years I have been using social media and have never taken a formal break. And now I work in communications. For folks who work in communications, whether you work at a local shop, a nonprofit, start up, or big media corporation, you know what that means. You can’t take a break, and especially when things in the world are most triggering — you definitely can’t take a break. Even if I wanted to take a break from my personal social media, I’d have to be on social media for my job regardless. So in order to take a real social media detox, I need to take off work. I decided to take off two weeks, an eternity which actually passed in the blink of an eye because I decided to book myself busy.
After these two busy weeks, I felt socially satiated but my energy was depleted. Being off social media did indeed allow for a new silence in my life, and I simply had more time because I wasn’t staring at my phone. Like, I had hours back. But in hopes to make “use” of my two week staycation, almost every free minute was scheduled. Doing freelance work (lol), hanging with friends, attending workshops or events, re-organizing my room, completing the extended version of my daily routines, etc. I was so fixated on not letting these two weeks go to waste that I didn’t allow myself much solitude or silence. Perhaps it’s because my brain views both of those things as empty spaces to be filled. Maybe my aversion to silence and solitude is not just a coping mechanism but also a hard-wired, capitalistic, productively driven way of viewing my own bank of time and space.
One thing I did realize in this time was that I didn’t miss being on social media at all. My main fear was that I wouldn’t know what the move was, but friends texted me and looped me in. I genuinely felt like nothing was missing from my life, and I had no type of withdrawal. Sure, when I was bored I found some weird corners of my phone to explore… got deep in the weather app, meticulously tidied my photo albums, and found myself asking the stars questions in Co—Star. But it felt like not owing anyone an explanation. I wonder if I have created too much of an image or brand of myself online, promoting my newsletters, SPICY events, journal prompts, etc. The online version of me is demanding. Curation has become the death of my whimsy; a painful picking apart. The discarded items, things that feel too risqué, off-beat, TMI, or generally outside of the “brand” may get sorted into a finsta or close friends. And that’s fine, and that allows for privacy and openness with a select few. I like that. But I still didn’t miss it during my social media detox.
When I think back to the ways I used to engage with social media, my presence varied in each platform from highly curated to anti-curation. On MySpace and Tumblr my creativity unleashed, changing the skins of my page, trying every theme, reposting the perfect images, updating my profile songs, etc. I don’t use these websites anymore, and the creativity I once put into them I can now put into my own life. My apartment, my wardrobe, my art, etc. (a perk of adulthood I have grown to take for granted). But on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, I captured the present moment with no preparation. I was posting in response to nothing, I was speaking into silence. I used to be listening to a Lil Wayne song, hear the lyrics, and immediately make one my Facebook status. I used to be at the club and take a video from the Instagram app and post it directly with a caption like, “Vibes at the club right now!” I swear. My captions were usually either lyrics or image descriptions. I honestly still post like this on Twitter, which is why it’s my favorite app (and yes it will always be known as Twitter in my eyes.) I don’t use Facebook anymore — it has become an online storage unit for photos. Instagram is my most used app, and unfortunately the one that makes me most uncomfortable. A few years ago I started making essays of my captions, a creative outlet that has now transitioned into this newsletter. I miss how clear and straightforward posting used to feel though.
Today when I post it feels like I’m responding to a cacophony of other posts, trends, memes, cultural moments, etc. I wish posting to social media felt grounding, present, sweet and affirming, like a place to share with friends and people I wish to be friends with who receive me with love and curiosity. These days though, one scroll in and I’m sifting through RIP posts, infographics, thirst traps, videos of never before seen deep sea critters, and event flyers. My brain is on overdrive trying to process it all. God forbid Instagram show me pictures from my best friend’s birthday, or content from my favorite independent artist. The infinite doom scroll very closely mimics my own mental spiraling pattern: no end in sight, progressively getting more intense, and removing me further and further from the truth of my reality. A term I learned from my beloved college roommate comes to mind: “Catastrophizing.”
And as all things are, this is by design. This app that many of us have invested in with our time, energy, attention, and creativity, is massively profiting off all of us. Once we consent to playing the game Instagram wants us to (post, feel anxious, garner likes, compare yourself, grow following, never feel enough, repeat) we become useful to capitalism, and in being useful to capitalism we become useful in the undoing of our life and spirit. Especially as artists, we give it ALL away. During my social media break, I read the book How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell, and my favorite story she tells is one about Old Survivor, a tree in Oakland, CA. This redwood tree survived logging in the mid-1800s because it was considered small at 93 feet tall, and it was tucked away in a hard to reach spot. Loggers felt this tree was useless to them and their business, and ultimately not worth the hassle of cutting down. Therefore, its uselessness became useful; it became the reason why it survived. Old Survivor didn’t have to contort itself into a shape that couldn’t be appropriated by capitalism, it just remained unapologetically itself. How can I do the same?
I grieve the excitement, acceptance, and fun that once came with being on social media, because the internet was really one of the first places I felt fully expressed. As a chronic iPhone documenter and oversharer, social media has been both a place for community, unleashing, laughter, inspiration, knowledge, flexing, and love as well as a place for spirals, comparison, triggers, shame, and algorithmic hazing. These days when I share a post on Instagram, even if it’s one I feel inspired and pulled to create, I often feel like I’m sending a risky text. I guess that comes from a fear of how I’ll be perceived, reacted to, or how it could impact the course of a relationship. But why should I be letting my own phone bully me?
My homie Meenakshi told me an affirmation years ago that only now made it to my whiteboard: Everything is optional. In order to heal my relationship with social media and continue having fun, I simply choose to opt out of Instagram Olympics. I never really consented to participating in the first place. Once I decide that likes or following actually has zero bearing on how I see myself, there’s really no way that social media could ever make me question anything about myself and who I am in my real life.
The lessons have been taught, but have we been listening?:
“You pretty pon di ‘gram, and yuh pretty inna real life.” — HoodCelebrityy in Walking Trophy
“Bad bitch in real life, show me real love give a fuck about them likes.” — Megan Thee Stallion in Bongos
And as we all know by now, being well-liked or well-followed does not equate to being a good person. I think back to my social media break and wonder if I should just delete everything and go off the grid. But I don’t know if I’m ready for that yet, and I don’t know if enlightenment for me will come from removing myself from these online spaces. Instead of striving towards the impossible version of myself that is universally palatable and likable (you see, people pleasing clearly transcends into the digital world), and instead of completely going off the grid, in order for me to enjoy social media again I’d have to embrace a deeply disciplined “fuck it” attitude, with strong time and energy boundaries that replant my focus in the physical realm. Like Old Survivor, I don’t need to contort myself into a new shape that cannot be taken advantage of and exploited by a culture of instant gratification, perfection, hyper-productivity and individualism; I have to return to my original shape, my original truth, and stand on it. Without thinking twice. Hopefully without thinking once.
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I recently had my first reiki session with the lovely and gentle Fuhima Tanaka. I had actually almost missed the session because I woke up to complete chaos, had a really difficult conversation before even having my coffee, and my emotions were everywhere. I finally made it (seven minutes late and winded), and we started the session with a quick chat. My emotional heaviness was felt as soon as I entered the room. Together we meditated, prayed, she read my energy, and I felt her accessing it. I was not skeptical of reiki’s power, I know people who have had energy healing before and how it impacted them, and I am inclined to trust most non-Westernized modes of healing. I wasn’t sure how my body would respond to it though, but halfway through the session I physically felt my energy moving. I felt energy returning back to me, and I felt other energy being released through my feet and ears. I started crying, and began to remember myself. After she had completed the reiki session, I sat up and was immediately fed dates, chocolate, raspberries and mineral water she collected from a mountain. After some natural, full, sweet silence we discussed the session. She was visited by two people, my sibling and my 3-year-old self. She relayed their messages to me, and gave me extremely, damn near eerily relevant guidance based on what she felt. She told me that she could feel how much I had worked on myself over the past few years, but my tools must change to support me on the next leg of my journey. Things and people, she said, will fall away. But new people will arrive. What has worked for me in the past, may not work for me now. She said, “We’re not here to suffer; our ancestral healing is in our contentment.” After our session I went to one of my favorite guilty pleasure spots: the rocks by the water in Williamsburg. Alone, I lay down on a big gray rock and bathed in the sunshine and silence for a few hours.
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I want to retire old weapons, old weapons that no longer help me. Weapons that instead of protecting me, have begun to hurt me, or prevent my growth. But if healing isn’t linear, then neither is trauma. Horrors of the past haunted house pop back up in the new apartment. The weapon I proudly put down... what happens when I need it again? Where did I put it? Oh God, when was the last time I’ve seen it? Like that one locked note in your phone where you spewed all the hateful thoughts to release them. Like the time you had the TV on for 72 hours straight to prevent a single depressing thought from forming. The disassociation, the detachment, the “ignore emotions, do what a perfect robot would” to public mental breakdown pipeline. You never thought you’d relive those moments. But you do. The devil’s trickery is deeply innovative. You will always meet the person who manages to press that one button you swore no one could even see. Sure, put down your old weapons, but don’t place them too far away. Don’t bury them too deep in the closet. I want to heal but I will always protect myself. That is how badly I want to live.
Journal Prompts As I Reacquaint Myself with Silence, Solitude, & Truth
Have you ever felt your body or soul was gripped by a spirit who wanted to guide you somewhere, or show you something, even for a moment? When, and what happened?
What does silence look like to you?
How does solitude feel on your skin?
What does truth taste like?
Think about one “weapon” or coping mechanism you picked up in the past that used to support you. How do you relate to it now? Would you like to lay this weapon down, hide it, burn it, hold onto it forever, or something else?
List out 3 metaphors for how social media makes you feel.
List out 3 metaphors for how you wish social media made you feel.
A shape useless to capitalism. What does it look like to you? Draw it.
Wherever you are in your journey, write yourself a short thank you note. Bathe yourself in a river of compassion. Forgive yourself for past mistakes. Promise something.
If you’re able to do the journal prompts, please let me know how it goes and do share any feedback! You can email me at pfdadlani@gmail.com or DM me on Instagram at @priya.florence.