I fell for this (and most likely so did you)

This hit me right in the face.

Even in my congested state, it felt like I had just inhaled a round of wasabi paste or choked on my favorite spicy ramen. The entirety of the origins of my journey as a content creator snapped into focus to see the image up-close.

It was a sobering moment.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not about to give up and disappear. Far from it, in fact. But it does make a few things clear, and I’ve been striving for honesty and clarity in the true nature of what it all means to me.

My affirmation of my core values over the past year has helped me reach this point.

You may be wondering to yourself if this exercise is worth it, and you may even disagree with my findings as I present them to you. Perhaps ignorance of your motivations and why you behave and respond to things in life are better off unknown. Maybe you prefer to just go with the flow and not question where it all comes from.

There’s something comforting about simply being a monkey in the tree watching the world pass you by.

You might as well unsubscribe to this if you believe that, though. What I share here isn’t exactly comforting. It’s designed to push the limits of your self-awareness, a springboard from which you can launch your own endeavors as a writer and a self-actualizing individual.

So let’s chew on this proverb for a moment.

If you can’t pinpoint the offer…

Social media didn’t start out like this.

When “The Facebook” arrived to our campus back in 2007, I was among the first to check it out and adopt it as a way to connect with my classmates. It was a fun little way to put yourself out there and share some of your interests and to compare notes. Flip phones were fairly common by that point, and the Crackberry was a status symbol of the more privileged college kids.

Texting used to cost a dime per text…do you remember that?

If Facebook were a person, it would be within spitting distance of being old enough to drink. Nearly half of my life has been chronicled on that platform, and not by me either. Photos of me throughout my life are popping up with “X years ago today” more and more often, and they are getting older and older…

These platforms aren’t innocent anymore. Those days are long gone.

Your attention, your interests, your very footprint is now monetized to the highest bidder. Your information was packaged and distributed out to advertisers years ago. Every time you open your phone to check in on an app or to watch a show, your actions reveal everything to them.

You are the product. You are the offer.

These days, you see ads everywhere offering to help you start a business of some form.

• no skill required

• no money down

• no experience needed

All you need to do is to click this link, give us your email, your phone number, and your name.

Just one of those is enough to glean a few pieces of information, let alone all three. Unless you’ve been living like Jack Reacher, chances are you’ve got a digital trail that lights up like a Christmas tree.

But that’s just part of life these days.

All the grains of salt

I feel a little like a hypocrite for discussing this.

Here I am sharing things that I’m learning and talking about how AI is a powerful tool for discovering more about yourself, why it’s important to expand your digital footprint and to leave a legacy on the internet so that there’s something to pass on when you’re pushing up daisies…

Yet I’m also presenting red flags that I’ve discovered and cautioning you about what it means to have so many of your thoughts in cyberspace.

What I’m trying to say is this: beware of the gurus out there who claim they are “fully transparent” and that they will show you exactly how they made millions from activities like day trading, crypto, and drop-shipping. There’s a very high chance that they made all that money selling how to do it rather than actually doing it themselves.

Everything can be faked on the internet now.

Proof of sales, statistics, metrics, testimonials…these can all be manipulated and gamed to suggest wildly lucrative results. Even AI-generated video testimonials will soon become indistinguishable from real ones.

Human psychology can’t keep up with the progression of AI.

This is the crux of what I’m here for. The more aware you are of your values and principles, your beliefs and your potential weaknesses, the better chance you have of keeping yourself from falling for the siren’s calls that are becoming increasingly common across every social media platform.

If you recall, this is one of my seven core values…justice and integrity.

So am I a wolf in this proverb?

My thoughts on this saying

Where I hunt is a place you’ll never reach.

I can show you because I am the only person who is me. I can’t lead you to a place where I can exploit you or harm you or convince you to become me. The only thing I can show you is how I’m discovering my hunting grounds and how I operate in them as I figure things out.

I came across Dan Koe back in 2022.

Did you know that it’s not even his real name? I didn’t realize this until recently. There’s nothing wrong with that, and I understand the need for privacy, but it was a surprising piece of information. What I fell for wasn’t his true message, but how he presented it as a means to build a business. It took nearly a year for me to realize that I wasn’t really his target audience and that the entire process was far more difficult because of my own shortcomings.

So many have jumped on the bandwagon of writing for money because it’s a compelling argument. Words are incredibly powerful when used correctly, but it is a true skill and craft that doesn’t just magically materialize within weeks.

You have to put in the work, and the fewer adjacent skills you have for entrepreneurship and marketing you possess, the harder the rest of it is going to be.

Whatever you do, do your due diligence on the person that’s pitching you the dream. Their unfair advantage is pretty obvious if you put forth the effort. Some of them have shady deals that fell apart, scams that went sideways, past convictions from fraud and grift. Others have shiny resumes with deep marketing backgrounds or life experiences that forced them to grow and have the receipts.

Those are the ones you want to learn from. Just keep in mind that their background isn’t yours. Mileage WILL vary.

P.S.

I’m feeling better now. I’m still terribly congested, and the migraine is only now starting to subside. I don’t have all the answers, but I want to help you. That’s why I write.

Let me know how your experience has been in your process, if you’ve come across as many grifters or scammy pitches as I have.

Thanks for reading.