Platform hangover

Lately, I’ve been focusing on less. Less news. Less screen time. Less of the daily drizzle that is our reality highway.

I felt bloated by everything I had to keep up with: what to know, what to learn, what to do. So I started retreating. Cocooning. You’ve probably noticed this here, in this newsletter. The process of examining and connecting dots that once gave me clarity started to feel... redundant.

Maybe it’s the newsletter boom. Or the growing apathy toward social platforms—something the entire marketing industry seems to be ignoring. (It’ll catch up soon in the form of the next/new XYZ playbook.)

I started asking: how much is enough—for me as a person, and as a business? At what point does doing it all stop being productive and start draining creativity?

I’ve always circled the question of enough. In my strategy practice, I help companies figure out how much to say, share, and market. The balance between overdoing it and not doing enough is a moving target. A seesaw.

And people feel it. They’re sensitive to it. Increasingly, I see them retreating into closed digital spaces, not performative, but connective. I’m not alone in missing real connection.

It’s ironic that brands preach connection and engagement, yet rely on platforms that do the opposite, gluing you to the feed, not to each other. The goal isn’t to connect people with people, but people with the platform.

This may be obvious. But still we flock to LinkedIn or Instagram or X, afraid of losing touch with the world, our peers, what’s happening. But how much are we really connecting?

We’ve become jesters at the king’s court, playing for the crowd. It’s not a new dynamic in professional life, but it feels more exhausting now. We’re performing from our couches, at brunch, mid-conversation. Constantly on, constantly judging and being judged.

No wonder we’re retreating. And it’s not just me. Screen time is up, but engagement is slipping. Marketers are scrambling to reclaim attention. AI-generated content comes just in time to pump more stuff into the system.

It’s novel. But still, passive. Still not connection.

Take LinkedIn. Once about business networks, now a decaying scroll of pseudo-hacks and empty thought leadership. It’s never been harder to cut through the noise. The platform leans into paid models—not to connect, but to reach. It’s become another marketing tool. “Networking”? Whatever that was, it’s been algorithm-ed away.

Instagram? An ad feed with a side of data mining. If you haven’t noticed you’re a little data hamster spinning the feed-wheel, I salute your detachment.

We’re on the cusp of something else. Something post-engagement, post-influence, post-platform. If you’re paying attention, the signals are already there:

“I don’t check it often.”

“I’m hardly on there.”

“It’s a time-sucker.”

People are quietly, sometimes unknowingly, looking elsewhere for connection.

What if the real shift isn’t in platforms or tools, but in us?

What if we’ve simply had enough—of performing, optimizing, broadcasting—and we’re starting to remember how to simply relate?

Relating means practicing empathy—something our political climate is starved for, something our kids need to learn, and we need to re-learn. It also means cherishing the connections we already have and turning them into active relationships, whether personal or professional.

Because we’re not just burnt out. We’re drifting. Professionally detached. Disconnected not just from others, but from why we connected in the first place.

Maybe it’s time to re-learn how to network, not to grow reach, but to grow roots.