Can you imagine being able to hold a lifetime in your hands?
It may surprise you to know you’ve already done this many, many times. When you might ask? Well reader, have you ever sat down with your grandma to look through an old photo album? There in your lap held a collection of photographs depicting the youth, teen years, and adulthood of your family members—and for some individuals, one of the lot may be their only existing photo. Now, imagine how many photo albums it would take to log your teen years alone—is your brain straining yet? It should be. There are 27,800 photos uploaded to Instagram every minute, 208,300 to Facebook, and thousands of others to various social media outlets. We’ve gone from documenting weddings, births and reunions to photos of In-N-Out Burgers and sloppy nights out. This isn’t a call to scrapbooking—this is a question we all have to ask ourselves: are we capturing memories, or are we interrupting them?
In 2000, Japan was introduced to the world’s first camera phone. From there, technology would soar to new heights. Preteens snapped selfies for their MySpace profiles on Razr flip phones, soon to be replaced by retina display iPhones that we now use to take quick snapshots of our lunch. With camera technology more accessible than ever before, everyone is a “photographer”. Filters and apps allow us to alter our photos in ways we would be hopeless to recreate on our own. And not to mention the millions of social media apps: Snapchat, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Vine (to name a few) all provide us with a platform to publish our images. These amenities are available without need for skill or talents, leaving us free to publish whatever we want, and scrolling through news feeds saturated with endless media.
Have you ever made plans with a friend only to spend less time talking and more time taking photos? While this can be annoying, it is also easy to fall into the habit of doing so. If I look good, I want documentation! I’ll be the first to admit that my Instagram probably isn’t an accurate representation of what I look like. The reason why: I can control what’s on there. I can select to upload the photo were my flat butt looks “less flat” and not the unflattering one my friend opted to post because she liked the way she looked in it. We’re not putting our best foot forward; we’re putting on a front! In the back of our minds we want our audience to stalk our social media and think:,“wow, she’s pretty!” or “wow, she visited that metal bean sculpture in Chicago!” or a vague “wow, look how interesting she is!” Social media can make us feel like we have something to prove; something that can only be satisfied with followers, likes, and retweets. We’re hungry for connection, but we’re looking in the wrong places.
Here’s the situation: your significant other wants to take you out tonight! You pick out the perfect outfit (definitely not the one you were photographed in last weekend) and snap a few selfies before he or she picks you up. At the restaurant, you take a couple pic outside and snapchat a few times before dinner arrives. Does this sound like you? Now, rewind—only this time you don’t have your phone on hand. Imagine being connected with nothing but the person sitting across from you. Real intimacy, real conversations that don’t revolve around a funny meme you spied on Twitter between devouring bread baskets. And you shouldn’t just want this with your significant other; you should want to connect with your friends and your family, and to give them all your undivided attention! Photos on Instagram won’t create memories with you, and posing for group photos, checking to see if they’re usable, and retrying until they are is not a memory you will be pointing to when you sit down with your grandchildren.
With all of that said, I’m in no way trying to bash social media, or make you feel bad for using it. I think it can be a wonderful tool to keep in touch with friends (and to spread the word about awesome sites like HC!). But occasionally we become obsessed with it, and we let it take over. At times it can feel like we’re engulfed in media—but when you unplug from all of that, when you connect with reality and not an app, you’ll find that all the technology that was supposed to bring you closer to your surroundings is just putting a filter on the real thing.
You don’t have to throw your phone out the window to combat this. Next time you pull out your devices when you’re with a friend or significant other, take a second to think: is putting a pause on your conversation to take a Snapchat going to enhance the moment, or is it going to interrupt it?
Photos courtesy Flickr, Instagram