A Guide to Post-Authenticity Living

Welcome to the Simulation

Reality is overrated. It was glitchy, unpredictable, full of shadows and weird smells. But now? Now we live in a perfectly curated feed. Authenticity collapsed under the weight of its own hashtags, and in its place: Post-Authenticity Living™ — streamlined, strategic, simulated.

This guide will teach you how to thrive in the glimmering ruins of the real.

Step One: Choose Your Persona (Not Your Personality)

Forget identity. That’s messy, unscalable, and frankly bad for the algorithm. What you need is a Brand Shell™ — a high-performing facsimile of a person, optimized for maximum engagement. Choose from:

- The Soft-Doom Mystic (crystals, collapse, and carefully curated despair)

- The Neurodivergent Hustler (burnout as aesthetic)

- The Earnest Ironist (sincere in your sarcasm and sarcastic in your sincerity)

- The Post-Queer-Cyber-Farmer (think: polyamory, code, and chickens)

Remember: It's not about being someone. It's about being watchable.

Step Two: Monetize the Void

You don’t need a product. You are the product. Post-Authenticity Living is about generating income from existence-as-performance. Everything you do is content. Everything you don’t do is also content, if you frame the absence well enough.

Try:

- “Why I took a break from posting (even though I didn’t)”

- “Unboxing my burnout”

- “What the Simulation taught me about self-love”

If you're tired, monetize the exhaustion. If you're numb, sell the numbness. There’s a market for everything, as long as it’s aesthetic.

Step Three: Curate Your Contradictions

The algorithm loves chaos — as long as it's stylish.

Be:

- Vegan, but only on weekdays.

- Anti-capitalist, but sponsored by a smoothie startup.

- Pro-boundaries, but post crying selfies at 3 a.m.

Contradictions = complexity = engagement = you win.

Just make sure your contradictions don’t cancel each other out — they should create a shimmering sense of almost-coherence. The illusion of depth is better than the risk of having any.

Step Four: Outsource Intimacy

Feelings are high-risk, low-ROI. Instead of genuine connection, use the following templates:

- “I see you, I love you, keep going.”

- “If no one told you today: I’m proud of you.”

- “Trigger warning: joy.”

This creates the impression of intimacy without the burden of reciprocity. Your audience will feel held. You will feel nothing. That’s good. That’s balance.

Step Five: Embrace the Collapse (but make it cute)

Yes, everything is burning. Yes, the simulation is cracking at the seams. But look how good you look in this lighting. Post-Authenticity Living doesn’t deny the end — it stylizes it.

Try:

- Matching your moodboards to the climate collapse

- Releasing a “world’s ending” playlist on Spotify

- Doing a tutorial called “Makeup for when the grid fails”

It’s not about surviving. It’s about documenting the fall beautifully.

Step Six: The Art of Selling Nothing

Why sell skincare when you can sell vibes? Why promote a product when you can be a presence? In the post-authentic era, your job is to generate desire, not fulfillment.

Here’s how:

- Caption an empty chair: “healing here”

- Post a blurred photo: “what I almost became”

- Livestream nothing. Call it a Stillness Drop™

The market has spoken: people don’t want things. They want to be adjacent to things. You are not a seller. You are a signal.

Step Seven: Cry On Camera, Carefully

Tears = engagement spikes. But beware: unfiltered emotion is a liability. You must cry strategically.

Checklist:

- Ring light on

- Phone propped up at a flattering angle

- Opening line: “I didn’t want to post this but...”

- Subtitles in minimalist Helvetica

- End with: “More in my Patreon video”

If you're going to fall apart, monetize the shards.

Step Eight: Brand Your Existential Dread

You feel hollow? Excellent. That’s on-trend.

Now, channel it into a color palette.

Beige = numbness

Dusty pink = longing

Grey-blue = “I had a dream I couldn’t explain”

Turn despair into design. Turn meaninglessness into moodboards. Launch a newsletter titled "Dispatches from the Void." Remember: aesthetics won’t save us, but they’ll soften the blow.

Step Nine: Reprogram Your Memory

Post-Authenticity demands flexible narratives. If a past version of you doesn’t align with the current aesthetic, simply re-edit.

Say:

- “I was never really that person.”

- “Healing means forgetting, too.”

- “Who I used to be was content for now.”

Delete, deny, dissolve. Identity is just a version history you haven’t yet curated.

Step Ten: Be a Ghost in the Feed

Eventually, the simulation forgets. So should you.

Fade gently. Stop posting without explanation. Leave behind a string of soft-lit moments, quotes in lowercase, and silent reels of wind in trees. Let your absence feel like a statement.

No goodbye. Just... a glitch. A final, aesthetic exit.

Frequently Asked Feelings

because emotions are confusing in the simulation

Q: Why do I feel both seen and erased at the same time?

A: That’s called Simultaneous Recognition Fatigue™. It happens when your face is algorithmically favored but your soul isn’t indexed.

Q: Is my sadness aesthetic enough to post?

A: Try layering it with vintage grain and an overexposed sunrise. If it still doesn’t resonate, try the crying-on-the-floor-in-neutral-tones format.

Q: I miss when life felt real. Is that normal?

A: No. But it is marketable. Package the feeling as “pre-collapse nostalgia” and launch a capsule collection of blank notebooks and beige sweaters.

Q: What does love look like now?

A: Mostly slow Zooms, mutual follows, and shared playlists that no one finishes. Occasionally a DM that says “this made me think of you” but was actually sent to five people.

Q: I keep dreaming of things I never lived. Should I be worried?

A: On the contrary. That’s a premium inner archive. Capitalize on it. Start a series called “Dreams I Remember from Someone Else’s Life.” It’s already trending.

Q: Will I ever feel whole again?

A: That depends. Wholeness is now a subscription-based feature. Free trials expire in 7 days. Credit card required.