I was 15 years old when I first downloaded social media and I wouldn’t consider it as a decision that I made willingly. I felt so much pressure from those around me to create an account on Instagram and Facebook, as if it would give me some sort of social capital that I never had. It was the place where people communicated the most and I often felt like I was somehow missing out. Now, when I look back, I realize that I wasn’t missing out before I got on social media; I’m missing out now.
When I have nothing else to do (or when I have several things to do), I find myself scrolling through Instagram. Lounging around? Scrolling. “Watching” a movie? Scrolling. Exam tomorrow? Still scrolling. I know how to shut off the app at the end of the day when I need to get something done or I’ve just simply had enough. But the problem is that when I turn on my phone again, it’s often the first app I go to (thank you to the iPhone Screen-Time Monitoring app for rubbing salt in my wound). One funny meme leads to another and I eventually realize that more time than I had hoped had passed by.
Though social media can be home to funny videos and positive quotes, almost everyone and everything on social media are fake. From airbrushed photos to outdated vacations to posed “candid” pictures to heavy filters to photoshop. It isn’t like this is new…we’ve known it from the start and we’ve heard it a million times before: “don’t believe everything you see on the internet.”
Like many people, I have struggled with body image and personal insecurities. It’s not fun constantly viewing yourself through a lens of inadequacy and it’s even worse when you know that what you see is just the best projection and not the everyday reality.
That’s why it’s extremely important to control what you see. I unfollowed celebrities. I unfollowed people who I wasn’t that close with. I unfollowed people who hurt me in the past, because I knew that anytime they posted, a flood of negative thoughts would come to my mind. And let me tell you, it was game-changing.
So, do what you need to do to make yourself feel good! Go on an unfollowing (and positive following) spree, or even deactivate your account to focus on the world around you. Don’t miss out on the real-life moments that are too precious to let slip by.
There’s power in having the ability to shut out what hurts you and let in what makes you feel good. There’s power in acknowledging the fakeness of what we see and are so that we can work towards making the world, even the virtual world, a little more real.