What Social Media Means to Me, Right Now

We live in such a social media consumed society. We value our worth based on followers, comments, and inbox messages that seem full of color, but have no depth. I think people forgot that their worth isn’t measured by Instagram’s algorithm. People trade authenticity for approval from complete strangers. Comments about your outfit from a random stranger in the street means more than someone sitting behind a screen saying the same comments to all the girls they follow.

Social media has put an unspoken pressure on relationships. Some say if you let social media, in its entirety, affect your relationship that your relationship wasn’t stable enough to begin with, while others say you shouldn’t post about your relationship at all, while others say to post your significant other all over it. If you post about it, you’re opening yourself up to people commenting on what they think your relationship is. You’re also adding to the conversation about how social media, specifically Instagram, is just a highlight reel. You should be real, even on the bad days, but let’s be honest, nobody gives a shit if you had a bad day. Also, if you post something about your bad day, you have people praise you for being so “real” while others will say you’re looking for attention. You’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t in the social media world. I think our parents stayed together simply because they didn’t have 7,000 other people following them at their disposal when their relationship or marriage got difficult. Nowadays, you log onto socials and get a high off of this false sense of security, appreciation, and understanding.

In today’s relationships, the person who loves you when there is no filter on your face and your body isn’t face-tuned becomes an option while attractive filtered followers become a priority. Whether you know it or not, you begin to compare not only yourself to other people online, but your friends and significant others too. You compare your relationship to theirs with someone else or to a relationship between two complete strangers who you ship on Instagram along with millions of other people. Social media has created jealous behavior over illusions. Some are envious of things, relationships, and lifestyles that don’t even exist. Comparison is the modern day plague. Except, it’s not killing people directly. It’s killing basic core values, happiness, and standards regarding everything from what you should be doing on a Friday night to your wedding photos. People get so caught up in what their life looks like online that they don’t actually live. Everybody does it for the gram, but make sure you’re happy in real life first, not just on social media. Your real life comes before your online life, remember that. It also means that not every part of your private life needs to be public. It’s okay to talk about what you’ve gone through—you should, but don’t post about it until after you’ve lived with it for a while. Post about things you’ve gone through, not things you’re going through. Once things are posted, they’re there forever, whether you delete the post or not. As much as you want to make a post about how you’re feeling in the now, don’t. Sit with it, live with it, then talk about it. Social media has its perks, don’t get me wrong, but social media has made too many people comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the mouth for it.