I Confess, I’m a Snob
But not the kind you think
Lin Fisher
I need to come clean about something.
I am a snob.
A music snob. A food snob. A water snob.
And when it comes to people — and the energy they carry — I am absolutely, unapologetically, a snob about that too.
Start with music. Because music makes this easy.
Walk into any large festival. Dozens of stages. Every frequency represented. Jazz. Hip hop. Heavy metal. Folk. Electronic. Gospel. Something that doesn’t have a name yet.
Watch the people.
Not what they’re wearing. Not how they got there. Watch where they go.
Like bees who already know the flower, people move toward the energy they’re built for. The ones who want a slow Sunday afternoon of jazz — cigarette smoke, a glass of something cold, conversation that doesn’t rush — are almost never the same ones lined up at midnight for the mosh pit.
And neither group is wrong.
They just know what they’re made of.
That knowing — that pull toward the right frequency and away from the wrong one — is not snobbery in the way most people mean it.
It’s fluency.
I know what I like in music.
I know what I like in food. Not in a precious, send-it-back way. In a I’ve-eaten-enough-bad-food-to-know-the-difference way. Life is short. I’d rather eat well.
Water. Yes, water. I can tell the difference. I know what I want in my body and what I don’t. This is not performance. This is just paying attention long enough to have preferences.
And people.
The same principle applies.
Not to their accent. Not to their address. Not to what they drive or what they believe about politics or which version of God they call on.
To their energy.
To whether they are awake inside their own life — or running on autopilot, reacting to whatever the last loud thing was, never quite landing, never quite present.
That’s what I sort by.
And I make no apology for it.
Here’s where most people hear the word snob and fill in the rest themselves.
They picture someone looking down. Judging the room. Declaring themselves above it.
That’s one kind.
There’s another.
I’ve been to the heavy metal concerts. There was a time in my life when that energy was exactly what I needed. When the volume and the chaos and the bodies and the noise was the right match for where I was.
That time has passed.
One kind of snob looks down at others.
The kind I’m describing looks inward at self.
One is about superiority. The other is about alignment.
And the difference between the two is everything.
Most people never really ask the question.
Not what do my friends like. Not what did I used to do. Not what does someone like me typically enjoy.
What do I — right now, in this season of my life — actually need in order to feel like myself?
That question requires you to know yourself. Not your habits. Not your history. Not the identity you inherited from your zip code or your decade or your social circle.
You.
The people running on autopilot never ask it. They just go where the group goes. They do what they’ve always done. They call it loyalty. They call it being easygoing. They call it not being a snob.
But there’s nothing easy about never choosing.
And then there are the moments when you don’t get to choose.
You’re at an event. A gathering. A room where the energy is all wrong and you knew it the moment you walked in.
This is the real test.
Not the carefully curated dinner. Not the playlist you built. Not the people you sought out.
The room you didn’t pick. The situation you can’t exit gracefully. The energy that is not yours and is not going to become yours.
What happens next reveals everything.
Do you collapse into it? Perform comfort you don’t feel? Reach for the drink to dull the dissonance?
Or do you stay present — grounded in your own frequency — without making anyone wrong for broadcasting theirs?
That’s the move.
Not retreat. Not judgment. Not a quiet superior smirk across the room.
Just: this is not my vibe, and I can be here anyway, and I know the difference between the two.
That’s the most advanced version of this.
Snobbery, done wrong, is a wall.
Done right, it’s a compass.
It doesn’t tell other people where to go.
It tells you where you belong.
And knowing where you belong — really knowing, not performing, not defaulting — is one of the quieter forms of self-respect available to us.
Most people never get there.
They’re still standing in the wrong room, wondering why the music feels off.
Integrating Your Reflection
This isn’t about taste. It’s about honesty.
Where in your life are you still showing up for energy that no longer fits — out of habit, obligation, or the fear of seeming difficult?
When you find yourself in the wrong room, what’s your honest first move?
What would it mean to treat your own energy as something worth protecting?
What would change if you stopped apologizing for the rooms you’ve outgrown?
OneUforia - Metaphysical Surrealism
Artist: Wildcard | “Center of Attention”
Gallery: OneUforia Arthaus