what happens when you start optimizing your voice

on sharing versus performing, and remembering why i'm here

Mar 04, 2026

does it ever feel like everyone online is putting on a performance? not in a malicious way. just… by design. like everything is perfectly curated to highlight only the shiny moments instead of the imperfections and the chaos of real life.

it’s the simple nature of the beast. social platforms reward engagement, so we put our best selves forward. and then metrics—subscribers, followers, likes, shares—reinforce it all. it makes the applause quantifiable, for the whole world to see.

that little dopamine boost becomes something we can’t help but chase. we refresh the page and check our stats far more than we care to admit.

and in a world where clickbait drives traffic, attention spans are short, headlines are engineered to pull audiences in, and consistency is rewarded, it’s almost inevitable that creators start doing whatever it takes to make their content land.

starting out on substack felt electric. i had words buzzing in my head that i was eager to get onto the page. instead of reaching for my journal to get them out, i’d open my laptop and pour my heart into a new essay that felt urgent. alive.

curiosity fueled my writing. i wanted to explore thoughts and ideas in a public forum. i wanted to see what happened when i let something exist out in the open.

and then i started catching myself in something that felt familiar.

i’d be ready to publish something and immediately think: how can i tweak this to make it a little more exciting? how do i rewrite this headline to make it more compelling? how do i get more people to click and engage with my words?

slowly, i began separating my thoughts into categories.

some ideas felt “worthy” of a substack article. others went back into my private journal where ideas could be quiet, niche, and not as optimized.

that’s when i started to recognize the shift. when it came to what i shared with the world, was i sharing or was i performing?

i’m not ashamed to admit i’m currently somewhere in the middle, craving a taste of both. i want my writing to be genuine and true. but i also want it to resonate. i want people to care about what i have to say.

i’ll draft a sentence and feel a second voice stepping in. the copy editor. the social media strategist. the part of me that understands what drives attention.

it asks: is this hook strong enough?
is this post too long?
am i rambling?
will this resonate?
is this topic trending or am i just wasting my time?

then my own voice pushes back with the question that matters most: is this true for me — and if it is, why would writing it down ever be a waste?

that’s the pivot that unsettles me. because i actively feel the tug between the two. expression and optimization. curiosity and calibration. writing for yourself versus writing for an audience.

the latter is enticing. it’s measurable. when a post does well, you see it. subscriber count ticks up. comments roll in. numbers confirm you pulled the right lever.

but then suddenly you’re A/B testing your online personality and everything that makes it authentic. slowly chipping away at your own voice.

should i be punchier?
maybe more vulnerable?
more controversial?
more consistent?

i scroll substack and see the noise that feeds this beast:
“follow if you have less than 1k subscribers.”
“growth hacks for new substack writers.”
“how i scaled from 0 to 10k subscribers in three months.”

none of that is wrong. it makes sense in a system built for virality. but when growth becomes the goal, your identity starts to negotiate.

you begin to think in terms of trends. you watch which pieces spike. you notice what people respond to. you feel the pull to give them more of that.

because those rewards are addictive. and dopamine doesn’t care whether it came from art or analytics—it just wants the hit.

but writing is art. and art is meant to be messy.

sometimes a piece resonates. sometimes it doesn’t. sometimes it’s long and researched and structured. sometimes it’s a few lines you needed to get out.

all of it counts.

lately, i’ve noticed myself mid-performance more often than i’d like. i’ll be drafting and feel my voice tightening. sharpening. optimizing. thinking about what the headline will be before i’ve even fleshed out the idea.

and that approach isn’t necessarily wrong. i respect craft and i absolutely adore structure.

but the more i treat my writing like it needs to impress or be perfectly articulated, the more my voice loses its pulse.

the magic usually happens in the messy part. before the headline and the polish. before scouring for typos.

there’s nothing wrong with growth. i still get giddy every time someone new subscribes and wants to have a seat with me in this little corner of the internet. i celebrate every little milestone on substack the same way i do with any other milestone in my life. and there’s nothing wrong with being strategic about growth if you know that’s something you value.

but creativity suffocates when it’s constantly being optimized.

when we tune our voices for an audience, something fragile and beautiful can disappear — the strange sentences. the little quirks that make our voices unique and human. the unfinished thoughts. the posts written in the middle of the night because that’s when they arrived.

when i optimize my voice, does it become clearer — or smaller?
sharper — or just safer?

i don’t have a clean answer. but i do know this:

i want my curiosity to lead. i want to write things that feel alive, even when they aren’t scalable or trendy. i didn’t start sharing my writing because i wanted to master a new algorithm.

i want this space to feel like an identity. one where i can build genuine community that feels like i’m sitting across from a friend in a coffee shop. not standing on stage in front of an audience.

so maybe the work is simple. notice when i’m performing. and then choose to share instead.