Updated July 2026This is a record of what happened when my account was suspended; it was later recovered. Currently, my Threads and Instagram accounts are still active. @tobie_talks Regular updates are ongoing, and the content for Digital Slow Food continues to be available. theslowcontent.com And electronic newsletters.
How did it happen?
Let me record what happened these past two days.
The day before yesterday morning I posted a Thread, and immediately after posting it I received an email saying there was a problem with my Instagram account.
I clicked in, and the system said there were issues with my personal account and would suspend it for me. I was quite nervous at that moment because, to be honest, my personal account was more important to me than my work account. It also asked me to upload a photo of my ID card, which I thought was perfect; it would prove I was well over 13 years old.
After pressing a few buttons, my personal account was saved; however, my work accounts, Instagram and Threads, were suspended for the same reason: "under 13 years old," and my Facebook account was also banned. The photo of my ID card I uploaded was useless; shortly after, I received a notification of permanent suspension, saying it couldn't pass the review. I heard it was a large-scale lockdown that day, and a lot of people were flagged for the same reason.
I rarely use Facebook anyway, so I don't really feel anything about losing it; I'm lucky that my personal Instagram account was saved in the end, otherwise I would have been in a lot of pain if it had been shut down as well.
The most absurd thing is that even my WhatsApp account was flagged for the same reason, with a pop-up window saying I "do not meet the age restrictions for using WhatsApp" and asking me to check my age on Facebook. An account I've used for so many years, and suddenly the system has determined that I'm under 13.
I thought I was going to break down, but I didn't.
Strangely, when my personal account was saved but my work account was permanently suspended, I thought I would be very sad, but I wasn't. At first, I didn't even feel anything special.
Perhaps I felt this blockade was utterly unreasonable; or perhaps I still had some confidence, thinking there would be a chance to get my account back in the end. If grief has five stages, I probably jumped straight to the last one, "acceptance," learning to coexist with the loss, having barely experienced the previous stages. I even think this is a good time to go back and rethink everything.
The reason I'm not so panicked is mainly because my main focus has always been on the newsletter. I have nearly 5,000 subscribers, which makes me feel much more at ease. People who really want to read my content usually subscribe to the newsletter; those who don't subscribe probably don't need it, and it probably doesn't matter if I don't see them.
Moreover, my clients, students, and communities are all operating as usual. We don't rely on communities for communication anyway, so this aspect has been completely unaffected.
A sense of relief that is hard to put into words
Then came a feeling that even surprised myself: when my account was suspended, my strongest reaction was actually relief.
Yesterday, I spent the whole day imagining how I would feel if I didn't have this account or this title. To be honest, I felt a sense of relief.
Running a social media account inherently requires constant public exposure. Although my account is faceless, and I've met many wonderful people through this identity, there are also many unseen people watching me from behind. Laying yourself bare doesn't always guarantee the responses you'll receive. Bearing this responsibility feels like having to create an extra life for yourself, separating reality from the online world. Even though I'm still operating with the same persona, being watched by a group of strangers always feels uncomfortable.
This feels very different from running my personal Instagram account. Many people add a bunch of acquaintances, or even people they've never met, to their personal accounts; but I'm different. The people I add are all friends I've actually chatted with and met in person. I don't add strangers. So when I post there, I know exactly who I'm posting for. Running a social media platform is different. Its advantage is that more people can see you, but conversely, the feeling of being scrutinized by a group of strangers is very different from the comfort of being with familiar people on a personal account.
There's also the comparison. When I browse social media with my work account, I often feel uncomfortable. It might be due to the algorithm, which keeps showing a lot of similar content, making me prone to comparison and anxiety. This is different from comparing with a personal account. On a personal account, you see friends going abroad, who's reached which stage of life, that's a comparison of life experiences; but when you use a work account to look at peers, you compare whose content is better, who has received what collaborations, that's a comparison directly related to your livelihood, the pressure is completely different.
It's a bit like the difference between leaving work and starting work. When you're off work, you're facing your own circle of friends, and even if you feel envious, it's only envious of other people's lives; but when you're at work, you're facing people in the same industry, what they do, how fast they run, everything is tied to your job, and seeing that just makes you uncomfortable.
So when my account was suspended, I even had a thought: Could this actually be a sign telling me that I can stop now?
I even considered just disappearing like this.
Following this thought, I even imagined simply giving up on Threads and Instagram altogether.
This means my entire content system, which I had previously built, would be completely unusable, essentially starting from scratch, or even disappearing entirely from the self-media teaching community. But strangely, when this thought popped into my head, I felt a little smug, thinking, "Is it really possible to just throw everything away like this?"
I think this way because I know that what's truly important to me (customers, students, and the community) isn't actually on these social media platforms. And I'm the kind of person who always needs to know when something has reached its limit for me.
Of course, it wasn't without its costs.
I'm fully aware of the losses this has caused. A significant portion of my income and media exposure comes from this account; losing it means losing a bargaining chip. I have several ongoing collaborations that haven't been finalized yet, and I have to contact each of them to let them know that I can't help them with exposure at the moment. One collaboration is particularly regrettable; they were willing to help me with exposure, and I would have reciprocated by exchanging letters with them. Now that things have turned out this way, I'm unsure if they still have the intention to continue.
A friend offered to check on my account, but honestly, I don't know if I should take this opportunity to enjoy this rare quiet time.
I started asking myself: Why am I doing this?
Putting aside these actual gains and losses, I also want to take a step back and take stock of a more fundamental issue: Have the benefits that self-media has brought me really outweighed its drawbacks?
I recently hosted a live stream on "Deep Work" and discussed a concept I really like: when choosing tools, you can start with the "craftsman's mindset." This means that you shouldn't use a tool just because it has some advantages, but rather consider whether the benefits outweigh the disadvantages for what you truly care about. If so, then use it.
Now I can use this measuring stick to measure the self-media phenomenon.
The advantages are obvious: it gives me much more exposure than I did with my previous blogging, the growth is more stable, and it can be used as an asset to negotiate collaborations. But there are also downsides. Given my personality, I tend to overthink things, and that alone is a drain on me.
What bothers me most is that all the content disappeared overnight. Although I had backups, the actual loss wasn't too bad, but this incident forced me to seriously consider a question: why haven't I properly accumulated my data in a place that truly belongs to me all these years?
The platform took it over without warning, but the blog is mine. So what I want to do next is to slowly rewrite my old articles and move them back to my own blog.
But this time, I want to figure out one thing first: why am I writing? If I'm just writing for SEO or to be found in search results, I'll gradually lose my own voice. I hope to build this website so that I can write for myself, writing whatever comes to mind and whatever I want to write.
Even my dreams are telling the same story.
There's something else I want to write down: Looking back recently, even my dreams seem to be reflecting the same thing.
I recently read a book about dreams, "Why We Dream." The book mentions that the subconscious mind constantly manifests itself through different scenarios in dreams, mostly visually. You can go back and analyze these dreams to see if there are any common patterns, thereby understanding if you're currently stuck in some area, and even potentially finding solutions within your dreams.
I found this idea very interesting, so I even turned dream interpretation into a skill to help me write down my dreams and review them to see which scenes match what I'm currently experiencing at work or in my life.
The result was quite interesting. I looked through my dream log from that period, and what appeared repeatedly was almost always the scenario of "being seen".
I had a dream where I was in a toilet. The toilet was so low that people could see me from the ceiling, so I had to lock the door. A while later, I had a similar dream: the toilet walls were also very low, and there were several semi-transparent round windows, so people passing by could see inside. The scenes in the two dreams were different, but the core issue was the same: I was in what should have been the most private place, but no matter what I did, I couldn't hide myself; someone could always see me.
If I were to summarize these dreams, the pattern would be very fixed: I simply don't want to be seen.
The recent suspension of my account made me look back at those dreams and find it quite interesting: if I really stop running my own media business in the future, will I no longer have this subconscious worry?
What's next?
These are roughly the things I've been thinking about over the past day or two.
This doesn't mean I'm completely giving up; I know the importance of long-term assets. It just means I might start thinking about switching platforms in the future, not necessarily Threads or Instagram. If the opportunity arises, I could actually go back to my old profession and start writing long articles again, after all, that's my foundation and the key to shaping me into who I am today. It's just that I haven't decided which platform I'll use then.
Another thing is, I seem to have become less fond of "community" as much. So I'm thinking, in the future, maybe I should just outsource this aspect and not look at it myself, so that I can focus more on managing my own content.
Maybe I've never been someone who likes the spotlight. You can probably tell from my previous jobs. For example, when my supervisor asked if anyone wanted to go up and be a stuntman for a live stream, I was usually the one who didn't want to.
In summary, so far, the "suspension" seems to have been more beneficial than harmful to me, as I feel more relieved and even a little happy.
Let's just see how things go. Maybe when the account is really back, my feelings will be different. I'll leave that to myself to worry about then.
