When my father passed away earlier this year (2025), several things came to me that I wanted to let go of.

• No more commericializing my jewelry, and only creating art pieces or working on personal projects.

  
  

• Stopping with the consumerist/capitalist/scarcity mentality and stepping into projects from a place of deep gratitude and abundance. Read this post (or this book) to understand what I'm talking about.

  
  

• Letting go of the persona I had and was creating on social media.

It started with 40 days of no social media. I decided to log off so that I could be quiet with my grieving and not distract myself with the noise. My dad deserves my fullest attention when it comes to grieving and that's where this all stemmed from.

Then 40 days passed and I could not bring myself to logging back on.

Why not?

So I decided to extend the period. 100 days. Next, I'll try for 200 days. Then, 400 days.

Can I stop completely?

Obviously, this is a massive shift from my nonstop presence on instagram to radio silence and eventually, n o t h i n g n e s s.

My current ego abhors how I was projecting myself online previously. It honestly wasn't that bad. The reality is that I'm very curious what will happen when I completely stop my usage/dependance on social media. This is a very small online jewelry business with a very small email subscriber list.

The challenge is exciting.

The thing is that I've always wanted to quit social media, but couldn't. The sudden and traumatic passing of my father has allowed me/my ego to just let go of the things that were bothering me. It's a shedding of self, a stepping into a new chapter, creating a new path because, as my husband put it so simply, "if you can't grow from this situation, if there's no growth, did it even happen?"

I have to grow and step into a new self as I reflect on how life (and death) can come so abruptly. I am shook to my core at what happened to my father who was diagnosed with brain cancer. He was absolutely healthy, no health issues, and died 7 weeks after his diagnosis.

It's not that social media feels silly after witnessing that. I know that it has some incredible features and is a wonderful way for people and small businesses to connect to their audience.

It just didn't leave me feeling 100% satisfied. Therefore, this has been a wake up call.

Live life, and get rid of the things that keep me from doing just that.

That's the goal for this life's next chapter. To free myself and free the ego.

Thanks so much for reading.

Until next time,

Caitlin