You know those moments when your brain starts spiralling into all sorts of questions no one asked for? Yeah, this is one of those.
Who’s to say, and I’m not naming names, because honestly this could apply to different people, different profiles, who’s to say that some of the incredibly successful entrepreneurs out there didn’t get a mysterious cash injection from some secret source?
I mean, how do you explain someone launching a full-blown business, a clothing brand, or some massive project seemingly from scratch, and doing it that quickly, that smoothly?
And listen, I’m not trying to be all doom and gloom here. I’m a big believer in the entrepreneur, I really am. But I also know there’s a fair bit of entrepreneurship that isn’t as genuine as it seems.
For whatever reason.
Maybe because you didn’t need to hustle the way others did, maybe because life handed you a few helpful circumstances. No, not everyone starts from zero.
And that’s fine. It really is.
This is my code. If you’ve got a wealthy family who could fund your education, your business dreams, your pet project, your whatever, and you’re a good human being, bringing value to the world, with solid values?
Then hell yes. Good for you. More power to you.
But. But.
What if that’s not always the case?
You see…
There’s this meme I keep seeing around Instagram lately, and honestly, it’s way less funny than it looks.
I couldn’t find the original one I came across, but picture this:
A young, gorgeous woman. Surrounded by luxury. Maybe she’s on a yacht, flying first class, sipping something fancy in a tropical paradise.
The caption? “This and a mystery source of income.”
And I hate to be the party pooper, but…
Can we talk?
Can we really talk?
Sometimes…not always, God forbid, but sometimes… “a mystery source of income” is code for prostitution.
Yep.
So…. We might want to tread carefully with the kind of messaging we’re spreading around.
Money doesn’t just appear. If it’s mysterious, that’s not always a good thing.
And this topic, it really gives me the creeps.
Social media keeps showing us these perfect lives, right?
But what’s behind those images?
What’s the story behind that girl, that guy, in that glamorous setting?
And again, let me be clear: I’m not saying this is always the case.
But sometimes, just by paying a little more attention…
I mean, you don’t even need to dive into the deep web, though hey, be my guest, sometimes even just reading the comments tells you more than you wanted to know in the first place. Like, for example, the poo emoji, iykyk.
Because, let’s be honest here.
It’s not normal for someone to be flying first class to New York one week, then jetting to Dubai the next, and casually shopping in LA the week after, all while supposedly running a startup or being a fashion influencer.
Could it be that we, the casual scrollers (yes, I include myself in this) are just spectators of these perfectly manufactured lives?
Like we’re watching a movie. A carefully curated fiction starring people we know absolutely nothing about.
Nothing.
And if you sit with that for a second, if you let it really sink in, you’ll notice something: those cycles of anxiety that come from comparing yourself to these so-called influencers or semi-famous figures?
They start to fade.
Because we’re not comparing ourselves to reality. We’re comparing ourselves to fantasy.
And again, for the sweet, naïve ones among us, I’m not saying it’s always about prostitution. But I am saying, in some cases? It is. And still, that’s not even the point of this email.
The point is: don’t compare yourself.
Because we don’t know, we truly don’t know, even a quarter of what’s really going on.
What we see in stories, in reels, in perfectly filtered snapshots? It’s been curated. Edited. Packaged. Just like a Hollywood movie.
We need distance.
Not everything is what it seems. And sometimes, that dream life that looks so real? It could be hiding a tragic story, or a dark, dangerous path we wouldn’t walk in a thousand lifetimes, even if it meant gaining a certain status or a bit of financial clout.
Everything has a cost. Don’t forget that.
For better. And for worse.
And maybe another question we could ask ourselves is: how deep are we in this obsession with image, with material things, with external success? That we’d go as far as selling our souls to the devil just to post that Louis Vuitton haul, or that first class flight over the Atlantic?
Anyway.
Just…
Food for thought.
Love,
Noemi.
P.S. This could very well be the image that inspired this newsletter. Here.
