Internet Proclamations

It has become customary if someone is leaving a Facebook group to announce in the group: “I’m OUT!” We don’t really do that at parties. We don’t stand on a chair, bringing the party to a complete standstill, making everyone stop talking, and holler, “GOODNIGHT I’M LEAVING. TRY TO HAVE FUN WITHOUT ME!”

Because that’s what we’re really doing when we announce we’re leaving a Facebook group or an organization, or a tribe—if nobody asked us why. We’re saying, “Notice me leaving. Miss me.” We’re making an announcement, probably because:

a) We’re not sure we’ll even be missed if we don’t say something and we want to feel important, or, at the very least, seen.

or

b) We want to voice dissatisfaction with something, publicly, because we think, “Of course everyone wants to know my opinion.”

or maybe

c) Someone will listen to us and make a change.

THE BEAUTY OF THE INTERNET

is that it lets us all niche down. We can deliver services to the people who really want them and not to the people who really don’t.

I don’t think this means sticking our fingers in our ears and screaming “lalalalalalala” to drown everyone out. If we don’t think about other people’s problems that we can help solve, we’re irrelevant. But we also don’t have to try to be everything to everyone.

We don’t have to chase after people, spending time halfway pleasing people who are begrudgingly working with us or halfheartedly supporting us.

We can devote all of our time to pleasing our rabid fans and making them so thrilled, so delighted, that they tell other people about us. “Oh, you need help with XXX? Well, Susan is the BEST PERSON HANDS DOWN to help you with that.”

In the long run, the person who came to you already primed to be excited to work with you, super pumped for you to help her, is going to be much more pleased, easier to work with, and happier about the situation than someone you had to convince, and who half-heartedly decided to stick around.

If someone isn’t happy because what they want is not something you can deliver to them they can leave.

Let them.