Mushy Feedback as a Somatic Problem/Social Media

If the discomfort about videos on social media isn't about bashfulness or fragile self-image, then it is probably about the discomfort of mushy, bangy, reverberating and faceless feedback. This is a somatic thing in a different way. Ponder that your sense of balance comes from (primarily) eyes-on-the-horizon, the inner ear acting like a carpenter's bubble, and your proprioception (how your muscles and gravity tug on you). When those sensorial streams come together and agree on where the horizon is, your warm body is so much happier. If one of those is off, you have a hard time reconciling where you are in space, and that is stressful. Realize that the problem with, say, neuropathy, is not just that your balance is impacted—it is even worse that your feedback loops are loopy, as though you were walking on large marshmallows instead of a solid floor. It is destabilizing. Socially, the mushy, bangy, reverberating and faceless social media feedback is similar—it is disorienting. Your system twangs—and maybe reaches all the harder for more feedback to try to assuage the metaphorical seasickness. That's my somatic-analogizing hypothesis of why some of us dread posting on youtube.