Member-only story
Ms. Marvel inspired me to keep writing
Even if it is for an audience of one
Recently, my husband and I watched Ms. Marvel.
Besides, my husband is a superhero fanatic; we both watched Ms. Marvel because we were excited to see a superhero with a Pakistani-American background on mainstream TV.
We're both Pakistani-Canadian and could not remember a time when Pakistanis were portrayed in a positive light in mainstream movies or tv shows.
After the end of the first episode, he turned to me and said,
"I didn't know I needed to see myself represented!"
Many of the show's scenes felt like they were taken from our lives directly — from the wedding dances to curfews in high school and walking through the market for wedding errands.
We finally felt seen!
It's good to be different.
It got me thinking about bringing your true self as a creator.
I have felt the need to blend in for a long time at work and in life. This is something that many immigrant children think about because we're trying to fit into an existing world. We try to avoid the attention we might get for being different.
Over time, this meant that I started looking for ways to blend in and be the same as my peers.
When I finally started blogging and creating content, I noticed this pattern seeping into my creative work. I consistently look for ways to blend in, forgetting that you need to set yourself apart as a creator.
I'm probably not the only one guilty of trying to fit in. We continue to see the same types of content. A quick scroll through TikTok will show you what I'm talking about — the same food videos, skincare routines, and of course, the dances!
Being the same only gets you so far.
It makes sense that we try to keep on creating the same.
As creators, we often chase virality, creating for scale — what gets us the most exposure. We see what worked for others and try to replicate the success. We tend to cater our content to what most people will relate to. In that process, we lose the parts that…
