I Cancelled Myself.

Last week I lost friends, followers, and a couple diehard fans.

It was a week of testing myself to the absolute limit, consciously choosing to betray my own values, and waking up each day with overwhelming anxiety. Why?

Because last week, I cancelled myself.

?Why the?hell?would I do that?

Excellent question.

**

Man's greatest fear is being?cast away from the tribe and left to find shelter, resources, and existential meaning - alone.

Thousands of years ago this meant certain death.

These days it means probable depression.

The idea that those who once loved us would now shame us, keeps us in line with societal?norms, rules, and regulations. It makes sense...but it also comes at a cost:?the loss of perspective.

Late last year,?I started a podcast with a dear friend of mine. We connected over our love of asking tough questions and bonded over our shared passion for looking at controversial topics with different?perspectives. We recorded a bunch of episodes that ranged from spicy takes on slavery to dangerous?perspectives on drugs.

This would grow to be the?"You're Not Gonna?Like This Podcast"

There are so many things we said that if taken out of context, could sound crass, ignorant, and hurtful.

These are also the things that when heard in?full?context, could challenge norms, broaden thinking, and open possibility.

This is when the fear came up.?

"What happens when we share these thoughts with the world?"

How will my friends and family react when someone inevitably comes around and uses clickbait?culture to paint me as a villain?

Who would be willing to do the work of hearing the message instead of just shooting the messenger?

I decided to find out.

If being misunderstood and outcasted was our biggest fear, we realized the only way to overcome it was to find out what that fear?was actually like and develop a new relationship with it.

So?we designed a social experiment centered around the idea of cancelling ourselves.

It started with an apology posted to our respective pages – "getting ahead" of the impending article that?was?sure?to derail our careers.

The next day we posted a doctored screenshot from a fake outlet with a vague headline about how statements that we made had sparked online outcry.

By this time, my palms were sweating and my "integrity?alarms" were firing at full blast.

Both me and my co-host Marco - two coaches who have built their lives and brands around honesty - were confronting the very real truth that we were actively choosing to mislead thousands of our followers and effectively manipulate their emotions. What irony would it be that we end up being cancelled for faking a cancellation...

To be honest, there were plenty of times where we were moments away from pulling the plug on the whole project. The only thing that kept this thing alive was reminding ourselves of our intention -?to call attention to the toxic cancer of cancel culture.

So we kept going.

And this is what happened:

1) The day?I posted that I was going to be potentially cancelled, I lost about 50 followers.

2) The posts about my cancellation were shared?more than any other piece of content I've posted in recent memory.

3) Over the course of the week-long experiment, I had dozens of people who hadn't spoken to me in years?flock to the fake news outlet that we created, in order to read up on what would have surely been a biased and slanderous account of my alleged?misdoings. The majority of them didn't bother to reach out to me directly for context.

All of this pointed out to us what we originally hypothesized -

Cancel Culture?discourages context, critical thinking, and?honest communication.

It actively encourages herd mentality and hasty generalizations.

So, what did we learn?

There were so many lessons from this experiment that I'm continuing?to process?but here are a couple notables that stood out about the "realities" of being cancelled.

Let's start easy:

Lesson One.

You're not alone, and you never will be.

?The fear of being alone?is just like many of our other fears - statistically unlikely.

That terrible thing you did, the harsh truth you believe, that perspective you want to share - you're not the only one. And even if you were the one bold enough to share it, you'll find that not only will the people who?know?you support you, but you'll find that there are a swarm of people who share similar pasts, thoughts, and ideas.

Throughout the week I was barraged with phone calls and texts from people closest to me who actually?did?care about what was going on and wanted to stand by my side and voice?their support - as I write this I also just finished reading a comment from someone who had been cancelled years ago for speaking his truth and found comfort in having this experiment bring this conversation to light.

Knowing this helps me move forward in sharing the podcast (and my thoughts in general) with more safety, trust, and faith.

The point of Lesson One is this:

Cancel culture can only control us if we believe?that we?could actually ever be alone.

Lesson Two.

People follow trends more than they follow their hearts.

We were "ahead" of our cancellation in more ways than one. When I first posted my "I'm sorry" post, I had a couple friends who were in the know, comment?their undying love and support on my page. (Originally this was meant to legitimize the magnitude of the situation not sway public opinion - but it did.)

I noticed how on the posts where they commented first, the comment section generally swayed towards support. The times where they didn't, that?story changed.

It's very difficult to scream shame at someone when everyone else is yelling love.

On the flip side, if everyone in a comment section is saying how dumb they think someone is, there are a quiet few who are applauding them for being a genius.

Either way, don't fall for the hype.

The point of Lesson Two is this:?

In cancel culture, everyone's first priority is?proving to everyone else that they're on the "right" side.

Lesson Three:?

Cancel culture is fed by fear.

The only reason dozens of people would run to a fake outlet or almost 100 would unfollow me is because it's a big deal to be socially castrated - and people are afraid they could be next. But, as the week went on and I experienced how much of this phenomenon was driven by emotion?instead of?logic, I realized that the fear of being misunderstood is as big a deal as I make it.

When I'm afraid of sharing my thoughts in person or on?the podcast, I now recognize that my fear is actually of being alone...and as we covered in Lesson One, that fear is a lie.?

When I meet the hard-to-digest parts of myself with?understanding - anyone who doesn't do the same becomes virtually irrelevant as I will inevitably?still?be met, supported, and understood by someone else.

The point of Lesson Three is this:

With a little self-awareness and a dash of logic,?cancel culture loses it's potency.

In conclusion,

This week was hard.

Dealing with the stress of being "cancelled" was only outweighed by the pain of knowingly misleading people who support me.

This self-righteous phenomenon of cancelling someone is?the modern day equivalent of the Salem witch trials?and it can only persist if we continue to be afraid of it.

If we choose instead to acknowledge that we can have intelligent conversations and even if we disagree, we can still create a world that includes both of us in it - our artists can continue to fearlessly push the boundaries and our leaders can continue to challenge us into the future.

And when they go too far, we can meet each other with compassion,?understanding, and a bit more patience.

Cancelling someone has never?and will never be the most?productive way forward.

- Imari

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