The Fame and His Journey to Stay Sane
In the digital age, everyone can be a star. Success and fame have never been this easy. Often times, all you need to do is opening a channel for your pets. As Andy Warhol, an American artist and film producer, once put it: “In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 minutes.”
And that’s exactly why it’s much harder to maintain your fame and success. Easy come, easy go. If there’s anything harder than vying for steady attention from the netizens, it’s how to stay relevant and sane amid all those attentions which are not all loves and adorations, but also trolls and hatred.
There is nothing bad about fame, wealth, and success. The perks of stardom are certainly hard to resist: those freebies, free trips, access to luxury and places reserved only for the elites, not to mention tons of followers if you also have an established online presence. However, what makes a successful ‘influencer’ is passion for what he does, not the desire to be in the limelight.
In recent years, a career of YouTuber or Influencer has ranked as the top dream job of young generation from elementary school kids to university students. The reality is that once passion becomes business, the fun of creativity ends up taking a backseat, the feeling of fulfillment and joy slowly eroded. To increase views and likes, they personalized their content by creating a story to it, sacrificing parts of their lives which should be kept private in the process.
As the law of nature goes, when something is too much or too little, it will somehow find its way back to balance. And the price to pay for the overexposure is steep as it directly hits your mental and physical health. Just ask Justin Bieber.
When the superstar announced on May 9 that he and his wife, American model Hailey Bieber, are expecting their first baby via a video of the couple renewing their wedding vows, the news immediately silenced speculations and rumors of divorce amid Justin’s mental and physical health issues. In the clip, Hailey was stunningly cladded in a body-hugging lace gown that showed off her baby bum.
Congratulatory messages were pouring from their families and friends as well as millions of fans all over the world. Despite the good news, there are still hateful comments. Growing up in the digital age made them tech-savvy and they heavily rely on social media to connect with their fans and promote their works. Still, they now need to take a break from time to time due to the onslaught of negativity and animosity.
Justin isn’t the first celebrity who has suffered overwhelming attention from the public and the media. The Canadian-born singer and songwriter has known fame since childhood. When he was 11 years old, his mother uploaded clips of him singing R&B cover songs onto YouTube. The clips caught the eye of American talent manager Scooter Braun who immediately contacted them and arranged for him to sign a record deal with entertainer Usher Raymond.
Since then, Justin’s journey toward the music world has been one of the most high-profile stories. With almost two decades in the music industry, he is regarded as a pop icon for his multi-genre musical styles and constantly evolving skills. Apart from Taylor Swift, the 30-year-old singer is one of the few artists whose every move and every single detail of life is scrutinized, particularly their romantic liaisons and fashion style.
After decades of media craze and obsession from fans, even an extremely social media-savvy person like Justin had to bow out of the digital world. In 2016, the megastar shut down his Instagram account in response to streams of hate speech on his posts of pictures with ex-girlfriend Sofia Richie. Earlier, he said that he would stop taking photographs with fans in public because it made him “feel like a zoo animal, and I wanna be able to keep my sanity.” He finally returned to the online world after a 24-week hiatus.
That was around the time digital detoxification became more widely known. Over the years, the number of celebrities who had pulled the plug on social media have risen such as Spiderman’s Tom Holland, Selena Gomez, Kendall Jenner, and Ed Sheeran. While these stars have an on-off, love-hate relationship with the online world, others permanently bidding adieu to it for the sake of inner peace, with many like Scarlett Johansson and Mila Kunis avoiding it like a plague. They’ve learned it the hard way that it isn’t worth to sacrifice the peace of mind even if lack of online presence might affect their star power.
In recent months, several top influencers from YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and X (formerly Twitter) have stepped out of their over-a-decade-long career, saying they yearned for an offline, peaceful life. While most Gen Zers are often trying to leave the corporate world for social media, they are applying for a monotonous 9-to-5 job.
The reasons are simple: burnout from sharing too much about themselves while having to dance along with ever-changing algorithms to stay visible. Exhaustion from self-obsession is also another reason. Realizing that everything they did was about themselves, they have found that life had become increasingly superficial and less challenging.
Although the level of attention is far from that seen Justin and other celebrities, the damage is no less debilitating, particularly if the aspiration doesn’t start from the heart. Every job has its own benefits and drawbacks, the nature of that job should fulfill our hearts and has enough challenges for growth. Any job that clearly erodes physical and mental health shouldn’t be on the list at all.
The full version is available in the 5000s magazine issue 58. Subscribe Now.
For Thailand Area
