Hello, my loves.

What a week. Let’s all take a breath together.

Let me tell you…it has been a time over here in my world. Let’s start at the beginning:

I didn’t post on my Instagram stories for nearly a week, which is unusual for me. And as I was feeling into what to post as my “comeback” post, I kept trying to think up the perfect thing for me to say: something that was of value, and educational, and awe-inspiring. Something everyone was going to be blown away by. Something that would have everyone going, “I need to sign up for her programs right fucking NOW.”

And I had nothing.

So as I set up my camera and did an embodiment practice on the floor in my office, at the end, I ended up just looking straight into the camera and saying…nothing.

What felt true for me in that moment was wanting to be fully witnessed in the nothingness. I didn’t have anything perfect to say. I didn’t have some valuable piece of wisdom that was going to change people’s lives.

But I just got on there and said, “I’ve been in a functional freeze response.”

That means that on the outside, I look like I’m fine. I’m able to connect with clients. I’ve been doing my one-to-one calls. I’ve still delivered the Connected Woman call. But on the inside, I’m totally checked out.

I shared that really openly, and so many people were loving the vulnerability and whatnot…but it was really difficult to share.

And that leads me into today’s topic: our addiction to perfectionism, and how social media feeds into it.

Avoiding Vulnerability on Social Media

I have struggled mightily with vulnerability in that past—in fact, when I first started this work, I couldn’t even say the words “I’m vulnerable.”

I don’t want people to know that I suffer sometimes. I don’t want to be seen not having all the answers. (Such an ego thing, right?)

I’m scared that if I’m vulnerable, I’m going to lose my listeners. I’m going to lose my authority. No one’s going to want to hire me.

And maybe that’s true—maybe you’re really turned off by my vulnerability. But if that’s the case…I wouldn’t want to work with you anyway, if I’m honest. I want people in my world who appreciate vulnerability, even if vulnerability feels a bit edgy for them.

All of that to say, it’s a really interesting time in history to be alive. I’m thirty-five, so I was there pre-internet, and growing up in the age of the internet has been a trip…particularly in the age of social media.

I’m so incredibly grateful for social media. I’m so grateful that I can sit in my home office at six o’clock at night on a Tuesday, sipping my Coke Zero, and reach thousands and thousands and thousands of people.

I wouldn’t have the career that I have without social media. But I also can’t help but wonder about the damage that’s being done to people through social media. 

The Need to Perfect

It’s exhausting to feel this insatiable need to be perfect. And thanks to social media, perfection is in your face everywhere you fucking look.

It’s on TikTok. It’s on Instagram. It’s on podcasts. It’s in books. Everywhere you look, perfection is waiting to pounce on your self-confidence. 

Now, I’m all for high standards. I want you to live the best life ever. But the lifestyle being touted by so many influencers on social media goes beyond high standards.

How many times have you seen this kind of video on social media:

“Here’s my ten-step morning routine. I wake up at 4:30 AM every single day, no matter how much sleep I’ve had the night before. I immediately have my glass of lemon water to flush all the toxins out, and then I have a green juice, and then I have a coffee. Now I’ve had two liters of various substances. Yay, health! Now I’m going to go for my hot girl walk. The standard used to be 10,000 steps, but now it’s 15,000. Oh, wait—actually, that was last week. Now it’s 20,000 steps. And if you’re not getting 20,000 steps in your day, what are you even doing? Are you sitting on the couch all day? Oh, you have a job? You have children?

That’s irrelevant. You really should get off the couch and stop being such a lazy bitch.

“So anyway, after my 20,000-step walk, I go for a run, because you’ve got to get those endorphins up. And then I come home and have another green juice. Then I do my everything shower and shave everything, because God forbid you have a hair on you.”

I’m taking the piss here to prove a point, but come on. It’s genuinely ridiculous how often I see this kind of thing crop up on social media.

I have no problem with getting your steps in, eating nutritiously, or taking care of your health. And personally, I’m a slut for an everything shower.

But when that becomes the gold standard–when you have to do this, otherwise you have failed as a human, and I’m going to quietly remind you of that every day on your “For You” page—it gets exhausting.

Don’t get me wrong, either—I’m not putting down these creators at all. I’m fucking one of them. I want you to be so confident. I want you to love yourself. I want you to have epic relationships. I want you to have amazing sex, and I want to help you accomplish all of this.

I want all of these things for you. But what I don’t want is for you to feel like you are a personal failure as a human if you fuck it up.

The Comparison Game

In the same vein, there’s such a strong emphasis on comparison in the social media game.

Scrolling TikTok, you can pretty quickly see that if you’re twenty-one and hot and skinny, you can do the absolute least on a video and still have it go completely viral.

No shade to them at all. I would do the exact same thing. I would be in my fucking crop top and miniskirt doing some fucking stupid dance, going viral, making bank. More power to you, honey. I love that for you.

But it can be so discouraging to see when it feels like you’re doing all of the things, and other people seem to be moving way faster than you.

This is something that I’ve struggled with, personally. I feel like I’m always behind, and social media tends to worsen that feeling.

My friends are all getting married and having kids. And if I’m completely truthful, that’s not a super strong desire of mine. If I become a mother, that’s very exciting, but I was not put on this planet to become a mother. So if it were to never happen, I wouldn’t wither up and die. Same with marriage. But it can still give you a feeling of falling behind and failing on some level.

It doesn’t only happen with personal things, either. You can feel like you’re falling behind in business or income or your personal development journey or whatever else, right? No matter what corner of social media you find yourself in, that comparison game gets so destructive so fast.

The best thing that I’ve ever done to combat this—and I don’t always get this right, y’all, but I’m trying—is stay in my own fucking lane on social media.  Because the second that I started to try to replicate other people (because they were making more money than me, because their videos were getting more attention than mine on social media, whatever it was at the time) I certainly became more “successful,” but let me tell you…I was miserable. I was so fucking unhappy.

If what it takes to “make it”, to get the guy, to get the money, and/or to have the career I’ve always wanted is putting up a mask and selling my fucking soul, I don’t want to “make it.”  I really fucking don’t.

It’s Not All Or Nothing

It’s not that you can’t have a ten-step morning routine, or you can’t have a goal of 20,000 steps every single day, or you can’t have a complicated skincare routine. It’s not about not doing those things. If that is what feels good for you, do it. I love my skincare routine.

But it should be coming from a place of enjoyment. I love my ritual of taking off my makeup and putting on all my lotions and such. But if it was coming from a space of, “I’m not going to be loved unless I am pimple-free and have skin as smooth as a baby’s butt,” then it wouldn’t be the healthiest thing to strive for.

We can easily get swept up in an “I’ll be loved when I…” mindset. And I can tell you from experience that it’s a false promise.

You’ll get the clear skin. You’ll have the shiny hair. You’ll be thin. You’ll have all your habits and routines down pat…

And if you haven’t done the work to love yourself, you’ll still feel fucking empty.

Get Connected…to a Community Without Compare

If this resonated with you, then I highly encourage you to come work with me. Come be in a space where you’re with other women who don’t want to use you as a ladder. In The Connected Woman, you’ll have women—including me—walking shoulder to shoulder with you; women who are doing the work and are learning to love themselves just like you are.

You can still join The Connected Woman if you want to focus on your relationship blueprint, your ego, your inner child, your shadows, projections, triggers, understanding men, boundaries, etcetera. And if you want to take that next step and go all-in on yourself for a year, and you really want to learn to love yourself on a deep level, then I highly encourage you to join my year-long group coaching program, The Experience.

That is my favorite space on the internet. We meet three times a month, every month. We have a group coaching call, an embodiment call, and a mystery call. You’ll also get access to the Telegram group, and women are sharing in there all the time,  taking up space and celebrating each other.

It fucking sucks to do this journey alone. So come be with other women who are doing the same thing as you and understand all the highs and lows that come with it. 

WORK WITH MICHELLE: 

Join THE CONNECTED WOMAN, a shadow-work course for women who want to go from feeling anxious AF about their love lives to feeling confident, secure and having unfuckwithable self-worth: https://michellepanning.com/the-connected-woman

Join The EXPERIENCE, a year-long mentorship for the woman who wants to play in the frequency of big love, epic sex and mind-blowing relationships with men…and herself: https://michellepanning.com/the-experience 

Are you a woman with all the knowledge, but none of the embodiment? Are you ready to remember who TF you are? Then you need to sign up for ALCHEMY – THE RETREAT: https://michellepanning.my.canva.site/alchemy 

CONNECT WITH MICHELLE:

Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/michellepanning

Website: http://www.michellepanning.com