From Chronically Online to Chronically Archived

Navigating Digital Life as a Gen Z Creative

I first encountered the term "chronically online" on TikTok (obviously) during, shall we say, a particularly interesting period (the pandemic). Back then, watching all the hilarious sketches about people conspiracy-theorizing everything out of existence was pure entertainment. I’m reminded of Eileanor Crilly’s astute observation: "We might all be online a lot, but some people really do need to touch grass."

If you’re unfamiliar with the term, it essentially describes those perpetually tethered to their devices. Their entire consciousness, self-worth, and understanding of the world revolve around their social media presence and consumption, which creates a highly biased, often apathetic, and generally reality-detached perspective.According to Urban Dictionary, a chronically online person is: "Someone who is basically always on the internet, and their entire existence revolves around being online."

As a twenty-five-year-old, I’m aware that I might be from one of the last generations to experience childhood without the internet or social media—or, to be more precise, at least a hybrid kind of childhood that was the best of both worlds. We were equally “Tumblr” and “JoJo Fashion Show” after-school kids while also playing with enough Barbies and NewBoy games and simply enjoying the magical fun of being a very present child.

But sometimes, I still think I could have extended that magic for just a bit longer if it weren’t for many complicated reasons. Despite being monitored by attentive, lowkey strict parents, my teenage hunger for “belonging” and “punk” led me into some really weird situations on the internet. These experiences affected my well-being and caused severe brain fog during my most sensitive years—something my generation struggles to put into words. It’s one of those things; you simply had to be there.

Because the thing about living through transformative events in real time is that you don’t quite realize they are transformative. Social media didn’t just open doors; it opened gates. It provided us with so many opportunities to redefine how we view and interact with life. But the negative side effects of new things take time to marinate and crystallize—and if you’re fast and lucky enough, to acknowledge and validate them in a clear, tangible way.

And so the symptoms began to float to the surface—those telltale signs of a human soul sucked into the wild world of the internet. It usually goes this way: a surging, undiagnosable feeling of intense anxiety; unexplained sadness; gut-wrenching comparisons to others; obsessive stalking behaviors; a demolished sense of enjoyment or achievement; a cognitively draining decrease in attention span; reading an unhealthy amount of theory; endless arguments; and exposure to bullying on the formerly cute, blue birdy app. And before you even connect the dots, you become chronically online—a face of the same coin as WhatsApp parents who dumbfoundingly click on hacker ads on Facebook. The only difference is, the threat of being chronically online doesn’t just endanger your bank account or personal info; it risks hollowing out your sense of purpose, leaving you trapped in a loop of comparison, burnout, and that gnawing existential dread we all know too well.

It wasn’t until I hit rock bottom—feeling perpetually drained and disconnected—that I realized something had to change. The moment I diagnosed this threat, new discoveries started to unfold. I began to understand the cause-and-effect relationship I had with too much exposure to the internet through the ways I tried to self-regulate. My search history was filled with titles like, “A Year Offline: Here’s What Changed in My Life After Deleting Instagram.” I was drawn to anything that verbally captured the feeling of having my brain fried. And I say this in the most humble way: I devoured digital detox videos when they were still very niche. I treated them like a coping mechanism for my own addiction, feeling like an addict reclaiming her life by consuming content about those who actually managed to do it. I was waiting for my turn to finally become a mysterious writer who leaves no trace—knowing full well that I’m the biggest yapper with oversharing tendencies and a rooted desperation for a community where I could finally feel relatable and part of something bigger.

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Everything I Tried (and Failed At) When Treating My Digital Existence Spectrum:

• Placing app limits and downtime on my phone.

• Announcing to everyone that I was deactivating a certain app, hoping that embarrassment might push me to commit.

• Deleting apps (I always found a way to stay on them).

• Trying to pick up more IRL hobbies.

• Asking a family member or friend to hold me accountable (we all became chronically online).

Things That Actually Helped:

1. Tough, lengthy self-work to understand why I sought external validation from strangers online instead of focusing on my art. (Turns out, the answer wasn’t in the comments section.)

2. Digital minimalism: I got rid of all the apps that made me miserable and added nothing to my life—not even a good laugh. (Yes, Snapchat and Twitter, I’m looking at you.) I also read Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport (Recommended).

3. Engaging with like-minded people—especially those with similar circumstances and social fabric. As a Libyan twenty-something in 2020, surviving a civil war and COVID simultaneously, I wasn’t going to torture myself for not being able to cultivate hobbies like skiing or camping as ASMR nature life YouTubers.

4. Reintroducing digestible parts of productive theory that aligned with my beliefs and stage in life. (I’m a thought daughter at heart, after all.)

5. Taking my bloody time with it—roughly five years of oscillating between understanding my purpose, redefining my values, and falling back in love with simple pleasures like reading and watching movies fully and immersively. Rediscovering long-form content reminded me how critical it is to cultivate my own experiences—ones that would eventually translate into my art.

6. Building the courage to show up again and take up space as a human. Creating this Substack, Chronically Archived, felt like a small act of rebellion—proof that documenting your own human experience is one of the bravest things you can do in a world where not having “original” experiences is increasingly accepted (and honestly, sometimes relatable).

7. Finding a New Way to Curate Media: I stumbled upon ARCA, a platform that felt like a breath of fresh air in the crowded world of social media. Unlike traditional apps, it offered a way to explore multimedia content without the pressure of numbers, algorithms, or performative engagement. It became a tool for healthier media consumption—one that allowed me to engage with ideas and creativity on my own terms, without the noise.

8. Letting my frontal lobe develop and sink in there. Just like that.

If quitting doomscrolling and learning to embrace boredom and regulated dopamine levels felt like an uphill battle, I eventually learned to at least enjoy the process. I found ways to laugh at the absurdity of it all, discover new people and ideas, and even reclaim some of the excitement I once felt scrolling through Pinterest and Tumblr—but this time, in a healthier, more intentional way. The urge to protect what I knew would become a rare asset in the future—a clear, functional mind—outweighed my bad habits, and slowly, I built something better from there.

Now, I feel like I’ve reached a point where I’m more in control of the things that move me and direct my actions: my online presence (mysterious was never my vibe—I have loud opinions, and the world will know them), my boundaries and privacy as a creator, and my understanding of how hobbies and skills can make this journey just a little brighter. Navigating digital life as a creator means constantly balancing the urge to share and connect with the need to protect my mental space—a dance I’m still learning, but one that feels more intentional every day.

In the end, this journey from being chronically online to chronically archived isn’t about perfection. It’s about progress. It’s about finding ways to document my human experience without losing myself in the noise. And if that means showing up on Substack or dipping my toes into Gen Z TikTok terminology (always with one foot out, ready to step back), then so be it. After all, the bravest thing we can do in this hyperconnected world is to show up as ourselves—messy, loud, and unapologetically human.