anything goes with emma chamberlain - the obsession with having an "aesthetic” [video]

Episode Date: April 2, 2023

[video available on Spotify] today i’m going to be talking about something that i'm obsessed with. in 2023, our identities as human beings are not just confined to our physical being. our identities are now a combination of our online presence and our physical presence. prior to the internet, if you weren't a celebrity, your entire identity was judged based on your physical presence. at this point in time, your online identity and your physical presence equally, in my opinion, shape the way that people perceive you. i've noticed that with the rapid development of social media, there has also been a rapid development of different aesthetics that people align themselves with in a way that goes beyond just lighthearted interests. to me, it feels like people's online aesthetics become almost a lifestyle, almost an obsession, almost a religion in some cases, and this is so fascinating to me. so today we're talking about our collective obsession with having an aesthetic, especially online. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, today I am going to be talking about something that I'm obsessed with. I'm obsessed with the fact that in 2023, our identities as human beings are not just confined to our physical being. Our identities are now a combination of our online presence and our physical presence. Prior to the internet, if you weren't a celebrity, your entire identity was judged based on your physical presence. The only other opportunity for your identity to be built in the eyes of other people was maybe through word of mouth, you know, people talking about you when you're not around,

but other than that, it was just your physical presence. That was how you expressed yourself. That was how you showed your character to other people. Whereas now it's more complicated, okay? It's getting a little complicated because now it's a combination of who you are in person, what it's like to be in a room with you, but also how you portray yourself on the internet. Now, the interesting thing about this is that in my opinion, they both, at this point in time, have an equal impact on how you're perceived by other people.

Your online identity and your physical presence, equally, in my opinion, shaped the way that people perceive you. I'm obsessed with this concept. I've talked about it a lot. But today I wanted to really lean into society's obsession with aesthetics, especially online. I've noticed that with this rapid development of social media,

there has also been this rapid development of different aesthetics that people align themselves with in a way that goes beyond just lighthearted interests. But to me, it feels like people's online aesthetics become almost a lifestyle, almost an obsession, almost a religion in some cases. And this is so fascinating to me. So today we're talking about our collective obsession with having an aesthetic, especially online. I would consider the way that we portray ourselves online as almost in art form. Because I don't think there's anyone out there who is completely 100% organic on social media. I do not think there is one person, okay? Even the most honest, genuine social media user is still staging shit a little bit. Posting something onto social media requires a little bit of calculation.

There's thought that goes into what you post. Even if you don't realize that you're thinking when you're posting something on social media and you think you're just kind of going with the flow and like, oh, I'll just post this. Everything is calculated in the back of your mind when you're posting on social media. If you didn't care about being perceived on the internet, then you just wouldn't post, right?

If you didn't want to show things to people about yourself or about your hobbies or about your work or whatever it may be, you wouldn't share those things there's always a level of intent behind posting things I'll give you an example okay, you might be looking at someone's Instagram and you're like they don't give a fuck about Instagram they're posting a weird photo of their foot like a weird photo of their foot, like randomly, and then they're posting a weird photo of their Thanksgiving dinner. And you might be like, there's no way

that this person cares about how they're perceived on social media because it seems like what they're doing is careless. They're not putting any thought into what they're posting. But I would disagree. Maybe they posted that weird photo of their foot because they thought it kinda looked artistic. And maybe they posted that weird photo of their foot because they thought it kind of looked artistic. And maybe they posted that photo of their Thanksgiving dinner

because they were the one that cooked the carrots and they kind of wanted to show them off. Maybe they posted that photo of them at Disneyland because they thought that they looked good. I don't think anyone pulls up Instagram and posts a pic without some sort of reason. Because posting on social media is not an organic response to living life. You know what I'm saying? Like it takes effort to pull out your phone and to post about something. So my argument here is, you know, I think there's nothing organic or genuine about social media in any way, shape or form. There's always a level of calculation.

Sometimes it's conscious, sometimes it's subconscious. If you're watching the video version of this episode, please check out how I matched my straw to my outfit. I matched my coffee straw to my outfit. I don't know. Like, that's the type of stuff that makes me feel good. And you know what? Me feeling happy when I match my straw to my outfit.

Like, that making me feel satisfied actually relates to this episode. That, I didn't even plan that. The moral of the story is what we post on social media is calculated with the goal of developing our personality, our character in other people's minds. I think the best way to represent the fact that we all post on social media with the intent of developing our character to others is the fact that if no one followed us on Instagram, we wouldn't post. Would I post photos on Instagram if I had zero followers? No. Would I post something on Pinterest if I had zero followers? No. You wouldn't post

if no one was going to be there to see it. There would be no point. Now, the interesting thing about your social media online identity is that it can kind of be whatever you want. You have the luxury on social media to have a picture speak a thousand words. When you are interacting with somebody in person, you have to speak the thousand words. When you are interacting with somebody in person, you have to speak the thousand words. You know, you have to provide context to people about who you are. You have to live and breathe

your identity when you are face to face with somebody else. On social media, you can post a photo that was completely staged. And it can say a thousand words to anyone who looks at it about who you are, what you like, what your vibe is, and it's easy. And have that paint a picture about your identity. It's a lot harder to live in that certain identity. Let's say on Instagram, you're trying to portray yourself as a super badass fashion person. You know, you're trying to portray yourself as super artsy and cool and mysterious and all this shit. On social media, that's much easier to do.

Okay, all you have to do is take photos where you look serious and you're posing all badass and you're like covering your eyes, you're always wearing sunglasses, you know, you're wearing sick makeup, you're always wearing cool clothes, you're posing cool. Like, that's easy to do on Instagram. Okay, all you need to do is set that up, take the picture, post it. And now everybody thinks that that's what type of person you are. Whereas in person, you have to play that character in theory. But let's say someone meets you in person, and it's on a day when you're wearing your workout clothes, because you just came from a workout class,

and you're in a really happy, bubbly mood, because you just got good news about something. That's you out of character, quote unquote. Like if your identity on Instagram is that you're this cool, mysterious fashion kid, that completely ignores the side of your personality that is bubbly and excited sometimes and gets all sweaty and goes to workout classes. Like online, you're

able to show one dimension of your personality seamlessly and easily. It's easy to do that. And you can paint this picture so easily about who you are based on what you post. And when you're having an in-person interaction, you have to walk the walk, you have to talk the talk. You know, you have to be present in the moment. You can't just post a photo on Instagram and then turn your phone off. You know, in-person, your character speaks for itself. And you can only pretend so much, truly. It's so hard to have a consistent personality in person,

unless you're being completely yourself. And I think this new obsession we have with our online identities and having a certain aesthetic and having a certain vibe about us on social media. This obsession that we have with that is starting to infiltrate into our personal lives. Because I think a lot of us are trying to keep up the image that we create on social media. And it doesn't work all the time because there's nothing to hide behind in person. But the interesting thing on the other hand of that is to a certain extent, the way that we portray ourselves in social media does impact the way that we're perceived in person. If I see someone on

social media and they look so cool, they're like this cool badass fashion icon or something. And they seem all mysterious and cool. If I were to see them in person, I would be like, ooh, they're intimidating without even going and talking to them. Just because I already have this pre formulated idea about who they are in my head. When in reality, if I were to go talk to them, they might not be that at all. But I'm not even go talk to them because I already have this preconceived idea about them. So this is not to say that if you create your online identity and you heavily curate it, that illusion that you've created completely shatters the moment that somebody meets you in person, I don't believe that's necessarily true because I actually do think that to a certain extent

That does carry into real life And the way that people view you and perceive you But I think when it does start to crack and when it may shatter completely is when you really start to get to know someone and you realize Wow, this is not the same person. This is a fully different vibe. It's almost like social media is what we wish we were in a way or is sort of this refined curated version of ourselves. Then in person, we can only embody that identity for so long before we start to crack and show all of our sort of inconsistencies.

Now when I say inconsistencies, I'm talking about the way that we brand ourselves on social media. I'm not saying everyone does this, okay? Because there are some people who are on social media who are a lot less into it, okay? I'm not saying these people don't exist. There are definitely people on social media who just post photos for their friends or their family to see these people exist. But people who are my age especially are so obsessed with curating their image online,

having an aesthetic, having a consistent personality, having almost a brand for themselves. Now, the idea of humans branding themselves came under my radar when I started working in this entertainment industry, if you will. I kept hearing people say, like, oh, that's so on brand for them, or, oh, that's their brand. Oh, you know, you shouldn't do oh, that's so on brand for them. Or, oh, that's their brand. Oh, you know, you shouldn't do that because that's not on brand. And I was like, what the fuck are you guys talking about? I quickly became aware of the fact that there's a lot of value in branding yourself, developing

an identity that's consistent, whether that's what you talk about online, or what you wear online, or what your hobbies are online, or what your values are online, or what aesthetic you portray. There is a lot of value in that, because it solidifies in people's mind who you are. And that allows people to connect with you accordingly if you have things that are maybe relatable to some people. And doing things that are not on brand is not a good idea because this confuses people who are connecting with you on the internet.

Because now people are like, wait a minute, who is this person? They're not who I thought. Now, I will say, this is a lot more extreme on an industry level, you know, talking about celebrities, influencers, whoever, people whose careers are on the internet. It's a little bit more extreme.

But I think that it's trickled down into people who just use social media as a hobby. And at this point, I don't even know if using social media is called a hobby anymore. I think it would be called just participating in society, period. Everybody is obsessed with sort of branding themselves on social media, having an aesthetic.

I would say the people who don't do that and don't participate in that side of social media are the outliers. They are far less common. So let's really dig in. Let's really dig in to our obsession with having an aesthetic. Now I want to explain what I mean by this first, because I don't exactly know if this is the right way to portray what I'm thinking, but I think it is.

When I think of an online aesthetic, I think of a consistent personality on social media. You know, what you wear, what you talk about, what colors your Instagram feed are, the way that you write your captions on Instagram, the music that you use on your videos on TikTok, the kind of camera you use when you make a video on TikTok. All of this curates a sort of aesthetic.

I'll give you some examples actually of some different aesthetics that I've seen online to kind of give you an examples actually of some different aesthetics that I've seen online to kind of give you an example of what I mean by our obsession with having a particular aesthetic online. The first one that came to mind was like the cool street style edgy kid. Okay, we're talking about somebody who wears super edgy, cool fashion, you know, probably takes photos in grungy locations like, I don't know, like in a band in warehouse or, you know, in a broken down exploded car, you know, they're never looking at the camera.

They always got their, like, they're was looking away. They're wearing like sunglasses in every photo. You don't even know really what they look like. They're mysterious. Everything that they post is super vague. Their Instagram captions are super vague. If they film a video, it's on like some sort of shitty GoPro from 2007.

Like, this is the edgy, street style edgy kit. You get what I'm saying. But then I also was thinking about the sort of super soft gentle cottage core vibe. This is more, you know, wearing a lot of white, frilly sort of clothing, you know, having bows in your hair, having books everywhere on your nightstand, you know,

having little plants in your home, having floral bed sheets, filming videos on a beautiful, crispy, nice camera with maybe like a bokeh lens, like the background's blurry and the forefront's super crisp and clean and everything looks clean, everything feels clean, everything feels gentle

and sophisticated. This is the super soft cottage core vibe. Then you have the wellness god, okay, we'll call them the wellness god. This is somebody who's always working out, but doing a hot workout, they're doing Pilates, they're going on a walk, they're drinking on a walk, they're, you know, drinking their green juice, they're drinking their smoothie, they're at the farmer's market, they're doing a yoga class before work in the morning

at 5 a.m. they're super organized in their home, like their home looks super modern and organized and clean and they have all the newest appliances, like the newest Vitamix blender and they have, you know, all the shit and It's this consistent aesthetic that basically portrays having your shit together like your health is right Your mind is right everything is right everything is clean and aesthetic and beautiful and Modern and that is the wellness God, okay? Then you have the tortured artist, okay? This is somebody who may be posts a bunch of stuff about their art or work or whatever,

and then in between that, everything's emo, okay? Everything's emo. Everything's sad. Everything's deep. Everything's philosophical. Everything's deep. Everything's philosophical. Everything's existentialist. Everything's almost too intellectual to maybe even a fault, right? But yet they're creating amazing art.

Okay, so this is like the tortured artist. Then you have the party kid or like the college royalty. This is somebody who's always posting photos in them at parties, always posting photos with the red solo cup. They're wearing matching outfits with their friends. They're out.

They're like, you know, hanging out with everyone. They have big groups of friends. Everything looks so fun and they make jokes about being hung over. That's the party kid slash college royalty aesthetic. You might also see them on a boat with their friends. You might also see them randomly in Cabo with their friends. All of their parents flew them out to Cabo for the weekend. Like, this is what I'm talking about. Then you have the workout God. Let's call them the workout God. We have the wellness God. That's one sort of fitness aesthetic.

But then you have the workout God. This is a whole different fitness aesthetic. We're talking about posting their favorite protein bars on their story, posting their favorite protein powder on their story, posting all the supplements they take. Oh, they're taking creatine today. Oh, they're taking fucking collagen. I don't know, whatever the fuck. Oh, they're taking fucking collagen, I don't know, whatever the fuck. They're always wearing like the same brands of workout clothes. It's like super technical looking workout clothes. Their entire life revolves around being a gym buff. They're like super ripped.

It's like this whole aesthetic, okay? This is the workout god. And then you have the, I don this whole aesthetic, okay? This is the workout god. And then you have the I don't care aesthetic, okay? This is like people who always post candid photos, always post random photos of things that they saw on the street, to be honest, I actually might be somewhat involved in this specific aesthetic. I feel like I enjoy this one. And I think I actually do it sometimes. You know, posting like a random photo dump of random shit that they saw throughout the week that intrigued them

occasionally posting an outfit photo where they're like wearing an outfit that they like, but they're not like posing in a super staged way instead when they were taking photos. They were maybe being silly or something so that the photo wouldn't look as posed. This is like the random aesthetic. I could keep going on and on about this forever.

There are so many versions of this. And almost everyone I know fits into one of these aesthetics. Now what's interesting is I live in Los Angeles where there are so many influencers, it's incredible, it's actually pretty magnificent. It's even possible that we can fit that many in one city. And listen, I'm not blaming any of them, this is not an insult because I'm a fucking part of it.

So, if you were to take the collective Instagram follower count of everybody in Los Angeles, it'd probably be the highest in the world. You know, like people who live in Los Angeles, if we were to take all the Instagram follow accounts, put them all together, wow, it's a lot. Like there's a lot of people who live here who are in this industry.

We know that, that's not a secret to us. I sometimes wonder when I speak about these things, if my perspective is completely off because I live in LA where there are so many influencers, you can't go a day without seeing one. And part of being an influencer and having a career online is sort of having a brand for yourself portraying yourself a certain way.

And the reason for that being that if you have a consistent identity and personality online, that's perceived, I'd say, more profitable by companies, you know, because they look at you and they get a really good understanding about who you are and whether or not you align with their product. And through that, they can decide, okay, is this a good fit? Should we work together? And that's how people who are online make money. There's other ways too. But that's one of the main ways that people who are known online for being a personality make their money. I might be blowing this out of proportion in your opinion, because I see this so much because I live in an

environment where it is very popular. But at the same time, I do think it exists elsewhere. There's been so many times when somebody random has just shown up on my Explorer page, who I don't know, and I've just been curious. I'm like, who is this? And then I click and it's somebody who has like 3,000 followers on Instagram that has a total aesthetic, and it's clear that they're just doing it

to build their identity, not because they're making money online. You see what I'm saying? I think it's a lot more saturated here in Los Angeles, but I think it's in the world too. And I've seen it, but it might just not be as much of an obsession as it is here.

Sorry, that was gross. Now, here's where I think our obsession with having an online aesthetic becomes a problem. When you commit to a sort of aesthetic, you subconsciously stop allowing yourself to be fluid in the way that you express yourself. The pressure to be consistent can cause a lot of mental discomfort. I think the best way to demonstrate this would be to give an example. I'll actually use myself as an example because I think part of me wanting to record this episode, how to do it the fact that I've actually dealt with this before. Becoming obsessed with having an aesthetic and sorry, I have an itch in my armpit.

I have like really bad eczema in my armpit. I think it's eczema. I would show it to you guys, but it's like really, it's actually like kind of unpleasant to look at. It's like not like a cute little rash. It's like this massive, big, flaky rash on my armpit that's so itchy. TMI moving on. The reason why I wanted to talk about this,

I think it's because I have always had an obsession with having an aesthetic. You know, for example, when I was in high school, before I even started making YouTube videos, before I had a career online, my friend and I were obsessed with Visco, VSCO. It's like a website, social media, platform where you post high-quality photos. And I remember in religion class, we would pull out our laptops and she sat behind me.

And we would go on our viscos and we would edit photos that we had taken on our iPhone, you know, over the past week or so. And we would like edit the photos and we'd post them on visco and we would try to make the perfect visco mood board of our lives. And I was going for sort of this California girl with a little rock and roll edge on my visco. So it was like beach meets rock and roll vibe. Okay, mind you, I'm like a 15 year old girl going to Catholic school, Catholic all girls school for that matter,

having to wear a preppy uniform every day. Definitely not fitting into my visco aesthetic, that's for sure. I didn't know how to play any instruments and I definitely didn't know how to surf. So I'm basically portraying this entire identity that was like not necessarily real, but it was this fun sort of art form, you know, kind of curating this vibe. And so, you know, when I curating this vibe. And so, you know, when I would go to San Francisco with my dad on the weekends, we used to go to San Francisco on the weekends, just hang out in the city, go to record stores, go to cafes, go get

dinner, go shopping, more like window shopping. We didn't actually go shopping, but we were window shopping. I love doing that. Stuff like that. I would take photos, you know, that would say something about me. I would take a photo of a record player in one of the record stores in San Francisco. And then I would post it on my visco with a certain filter on it that gave it a certain vibe. And then that sends a certain message to the people who followed me on visco. The point of this is, I've always been obsessed with this. But the thing that was a challenge for me when I was younger was I felt like in obsession with being consistent.

So for example, it would take me so long to get dressed for a high school party because I was like, I feel like I need to like embody a certain vibe. And I might put on an outfit that I really liked, but I'd be like, but it doesn't really match my aesthetic. Like it doesn't match my vibe. And even though I liked the outfit, I wouldn't wear it. I'd be like, it's not right. It's not right. Because I was obsessed with having an aesthetic.

And it started with me portraying myself a certain way on visco, and then it trickled into my real life where I was making decisions about how I portrayed myself in person based on my online aesthetic. And it became an obsession for me. It was almost like I was becoming a victim of my own aesthetic as if the aesthetic had power over me. It was the most bizarre thing of all time, but I can't be the only one.

And the problem is, is that that's unhealthy. Having this obsession with having a consistent personality, online and in person is such an unnecessary pressure to put on yourself. You know, you can post an Instagram photo of you surfing, looking supernatural hair in the wind, you know, sun kissed, surfing. You can post that one day on social media and then two weeks later, post a photo of you in a super high fashion, all black outfit, that's the completely opposite vibe

and those two things can both be you. But I think we prevent ourselves from expressing all the different sides of our personality, because social media has further nailed into our brains that having a consistent personality has value. In order to feel like your identity is consistent, you may feel the pressure to be posting on social media frequently, portraying a certain image. And the truth is, the only way to do this is to stage it. 90% of the time. Actually, 90,

that's a little bit much. Let's say 70% of the time. I would say 70% of the time Instagram is staged. And taking photos that are staged is fun. And in a way it's even in art form at times. Getting dressed up in an outfit, going to a location, taking photos, you know, or even going to an art museum, taking photos of art and cool stuff, and then walking around through the streets, taking cool pictures of stuff. All of this is in our form to a certain extent. But it's also exhausting. Humans are not brands.

When we look at brands, I can even use my brand Chamberlain Coffee as an example. Chamberlain Coffee is a brand. It's not a human being, it is a brand. Yes, I am the founder of Chamberlain Coffee. My voice is very heavily involved in the brand. You can definitely feel a piece of me in there. But at the same time, Chamberlain Coffee is a brand. And when I was creating Chamberlain Coffee, I worked really hard on creating a sort of brand

message, a sort of brand feeling, a sort of brand voice. And that's crucial for building a brand. Because you almost need to personify a brand in order for it to connect with people who potentially want to buy from the brand. People buy things based on whether or not they feel intrigued by the product, or whether or not they feel connected to the product in some way. That's how I consume things. You know, when I am looking to buy something, if I see two brands selling the same thing and they have the exact same ingredients, how am I going to choose one? I'm going to choose which one has a bottle that I like better. I'm going to choose the one that has a cute little saying on the side of the box that

sort of represents the brand as a whole. Brands, having an identity, makes sense. And in order for customers to connect with it, the people who are running the brand need to create that voice. And that voice will naturally stay pretty consistent because it's not a conscious being. It can't just decide one day, you know what? I am different now, like I've grown and I'm a different person now.

I think differently now. No, a brand is not a human being. Generally, brands stay pretty consistent with their personalities, their identities. Humans are not brands, but we're branding ourselves here when it comes to our aesthetic. We're putting ourselves in a box and telling ourselves, okay, we need to stick to this vibe. We need to be consistent with what our identity is. But we're not products. We are human beings who change and evolve

in morph on a daily basis. And I think that that's why falling into this way of thinking can get us into some trouble because we're not honoring our human instinct to be dynamic and to be constantly evolving. There was a time of my life when I was embarrassed in a way about things that I did that didn't fit into my aesthetic

or didn't fit into my sort of vibe or identity. For example, I've always loved exercise, okay? I've always liked going to the gym, I've always liked doing workout classes, I've always been into that since I was young. I was a cheerleader, which also doesn't match my identity or aesthetic at all, in my opinion. If you will, I was a competitive cheerleader, which also doesn't match my identity or aesthetic at all, in my opinion, if you will. I was a competitive cheerleader for five years, ever since then I've been very

into sports. But there was a period of my life where I was embarrassed by the fact that I enjoyed exercise because I was like, this doesn't match my aesthetic. So it was something that I wasn't really into talking about or showing people. You know? Now this was only for a brief period of time, but the fact that I felt that way at any point is like bizarre to me now,

because now I don't give a fuck. I think I've found a healthy balance, but the sort of shame that you might feel about having interests that divert from your aesthetic, it's so bizarre to me and it's only something that would happen in today's day. I think the healthy balance is to allow yourself to just do whatever feels right. And that's kind of where I'm at in my life. I don't feel partial to any particular

aesthetic at this point. You know, if one day I want to dress super futuristic in super almost alien-like one day, I'll let myself do it. If the next day I want to dress like a fucking cowboy, I'll do it. If the next day I want to dress like a pretty little princess, I'll fucking do it. If the next day I want to shave my whole head, I'll do it. If the next day I want to wear pajamas all day, I'll do it. I don't give a fuck anymore. I'm like, what makes people interesting is their layers,

is their dimensions. And I think clinging to a certain identity just doesn't allow you to express your different layers and doesn't allow you to express your different dimensions. And that to me is a shame because how interesting would it be to see someone's Instagram be like filled with cool fashion photos. But then one day they post a photo of them in their PJs

Playing video games in their bed and you're like how interesting, you know, like how fun is how satisfying that is to see Someone who we always see so fashionable so cool so edgy so mysterious is now playing video games in their bed and sweatpants. Like what a fun thing to see this other side of this person. The more dimensions we get to see about a person, the more interesting that person is to us. Your identity is simply you. You as a person. Your identity has nothing to do with what outfit you wore on Instagram, what photo outfit you were on Instagram,

what photo dump you posted on Instagram, what the contents of the photo dump were on Instagram, what tweet you posted, what TikTok you posted, how you style your hair at a given moment, what your bedroom looks like at a given moment, your identity is just simply you. So it doesn't need to look a certain way. One day it can look one way and the next day it can look completely different.

But that's still you, because I think what we tend to forget is that our identities are in our hands completely. You know what I'm saying? We don't have to curate our identities. They're already curated just by nature because we're individuals and our identities are just simply us. And so if that means that you're all over the place and you're aesthetic is constantly changing. Okay, that's your identity. You're just somebody who likes to play and express themselves in so many different ways. If you're somebody who is super consistent, just because that's genuinely what you enjoy, and you don't feel the pressure

to do that, you just gravitate towards a certain aesthetic, a certain vibe. You're just naturally maybe more consistent with your identity. And your evolution is a little bit slower. Okay, you know, like everybody's way of expressing themselves is different. Everybody's way of portraying themselves is different. And I think as long as we don't put ourselves in a box and pressure ourselves to fit into a certain aesthetic vibe, feeling, archetype, etc, I think everything's going to be okay. I think it's really interesting to see all the different sides of one person. And I just think that our obsession with having an aesthetic is a little bit unhealthy at times for some of us.

Some of us don't have this issue. This is not something that I think everybody deals with, but I think there is a decent chunk of society who feels this way, especially in my age group. To wrap this up, the moral of the story is, the way that you decide to express yourself at a given moment represents your identity at that given moment. It doesn't represent your identity as a whole. We are fluid human beings, constantly evolving, constantly changing, constantly shifting our ideas, beliefs, interests, etc. And there's

no reason to feel like we can't constantly morph our identities with our natural human pattern. There's no reason to feel like we need to stick to any one thing at any given time. I wonder sometimes if humans are drawn to attaching themselves to an archetype or an aesthetic to give them a sense of identity, to give them a sense of identity, to give them a sense of clarity on who they are. But I think that that might be the wrong approach, because if you take it too far and you become too obsessed, you might end up preventing yourself from discovering who you truly are and how dynamic you truly are. I think it's important to try everything.

Even if you're a workout buff, try wearing super fashionable street style clothes one day. See how it makes you feel. If you're a workout buff, maybe try to do pottery one day. See how it makes you feel. Take a ballet class. You might love it.

You know, things that you might avoid because they don't fit into your aesthetic could end up being something that provide a lot of value in your life. And you might not be able to discover that if you're sticking too rigidly to your archetype, that's all I have for today. Let me know if you guys have experienced this sort of obsession.

I don't know if it's something that is just so saturated in LA, that it's a big deal to me in my head when in reality, this is a rare struggle for people. Or if this is a rare struggle for people. Or if this is something that is incredibly popular and my sense is correct and a lot of people are experiencing this, especially young people. I don't know, I'm very, I'm very curious to know so you can tweet me at AG podcast, send me an Instagram DM, I'm talking like a fucking like gram,

being like send me a text on Instagram or some, you can text no, you can send me a message on Instagram at anything goes. Oh, what else? What else? New episodes of anything goes come out every Thursday and Sunday. It is always a party over here. You can check out my company, Chamberlain Coffee, if you would like. I was drinking an iced almond milk latte today, keeping it classic and a cute little cup with a cute little straw that matches my outfit because I'm obsessed with my aesthetic, whether I like it or not. Although I don't think, I don't think that counts,

because I matched my straw to my outfit because it just made me feel good. Not because I, like, yes, there is an aesthetic quality to this decision that I made, but if I had to drink out of a straw today that wasn't blue, I didn't have a blue straw, I would not even think twice about it or care. And that's how I know that I'm in a good place right now, there. Okay. Anyway,

check out Chamberlain Coffee. If you want, you can use code AG15 to get a little discount on coffee, tea, little accessories for coffee and tea. Check it out. And I'll talk to you soon. Peace and love.