I remember being a kid, laying in bed, listening to music, and imagining situations and interactions that I would never have. Either because it was a scenario from a book or movie that I’d experienced recently or because I didn’t have the confidence to initiate the conversation with the person in my actual life. I know with absolute certainty that I was not the only person to do this when I was younger but as i get older I’ve found that the number of people I meet that will admit to doing this becomes less and less. I think that the divergence occurred when we all transitioned to adulthood; some of us kept our creativity and imaginative wonder but a majority of people transitioned into adulthood, leaving the make-believe behind.

I will still shamelessly act out “standing in the rain” scenes when I’m in the shower and create characters for myself in my favorite books, shows, and movies; I have no problem admitting to that. I also know that I’m still not the only one who does these sorts of things but it’s less prevalent now that I’m older and that has made me feel sort of weird and alone sometimes. But then, I discovered Tik Tok; and let me tell you how hype I was. I was so excited, finally a platform where I could interact with other people who wanted to create something physical out of the ideas in their heads.

Unfortunately, very quickly I was informed that it was considered “cringy” to participate in that type of tomfoolery. Countless YouTubers have made “cringe compilations” of people having fun on the platform and it became a very obvious to me, very quickly that it was a polarizing, us vs them type of situation. Either you were on board with the videos or you thought they were insufferable and I think that sucks. One of the most recent videos I watched bashing Tik Tok was the one about the “Tik Tok Mafia”; the entire time he was watching the videos he was just talking about how stupid it was and how he didn’t understand any part of it, not giving credit where credit was due.

For those of you who are unaware, there was a user who created a mob boss character by the name of JJ and started posting videos. Very quickly, other users got on board and began making videos interacting with the other “Mafia Members” and weaving a story together. I can understand the criticism but I am of the opinion that this is just one example of fantastic collaboration between creative people. These people that had never met each other, just through the posting of 10 second videos created this narrative with completely original characters. I think that it is amazing that all these people saw this opportunity and created something bigger out of it.

Of course your content won’t be everyone’s cup of tea and you’ll have people who want nothing to do with you, but I have a great deal of respect for people who find something they love doing and have the courage to put it out into the world despite what people might think. My Tik Tok feed is filled primarily with cosplays and oc’s and lots of people probably think that is “super cringy”, but I think it’s phenomenal. I have always wanted to cosplay but I never knew where to start; I was also worried that people would think that I was weird or cringy but seeing these people cosplaying confidently it helped me regain my excitement for it all. I don’t know when that started to be a fear of mine because I never used to care what anyone thought but I think it had to do with becoming an adult and feeling compelled to “act like an adult” all the time and “grow up”.

I saw this picture recently that I will include below that talked about the difference between “fitting in” and “belonging”. It talks about how when you’re trying to fit in, you end up changing who you are and making “friends” who like you for who you’re pretending to be versus belonging which is where you find or create a community of people who love you for who you are. And if who you are is spending hours in your room in the middle of the night in full cosplay, I think that’s fantastic.

This is just a long winded way of me explaining that in some weird roundabout way, Tik Tok cringe compilations have helped me move forward in my journey to becoming my most authentic self. Which is quite honestly one of the strangest sentences I think I have ever written, but it is what it is. I am a creative, emotional, loving person who is just looking for her place in the world and I think I’m getting it piece by piece from places I would never have thought to look.