With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, I wanted to take this opportunity to shed light on a relationship that most college students have: an ever-evolving partnership with social media.
Although it’s often fun and exciting, social media can become cold, agitating, and sometimes even distant. To improve any relationship, it’s essential to identify what the problems are. Social media unfortunately has quite a few, but most of them stem from misconceptions about other people that are on social media, not social media itself.
The very first thing you need to know about social media is that most things people post aren’t truthful. Well, not entirely anyway. People only post media that they look best in or that shows them in the best light possible. You rarely see people posting photos of themselves just after they’ve woken up from a mid-day nap with the indentions from their sheets on their face, right? So, instead of comparing yourself to the people on your feed, try to remember all of the positive things about yourself and your own life. They could be small things like your favorite food or bigger concepts like education or family. Whatever it is, just call it into your mind and realize that we’re all humans traveling different paths with different destinations.
It’s also important to take the words of pop icon Hannah Montana into account; nobody’s perfect. I know you’ve probably heard this a thousand times, but that goes to show that there is some truth and weight to that statement. Regardless of how it may seem, no one is, has been, or ever will be flawless. It may appear that way from the outside, but trust me when I say it’s all just an illusion of inferiority that society and media have instilled in us. This part is often difficult to overcome and takes a lot of deconditioning, but if you confront any negative thoughts that emerge with your positive outlook, you’ll see things improve. Remind yourself that the people on the screen are humans just like you, through and through.
A final thing to realize is that even the closest of partners need space every once in a while, and that’s completely okay. The same goes for our friend social media. Logging off of your socials may sound scary at first due to the intense FOMO that often follows, but what we often don’t realize is that everything will be there when we return. The impact of finally breaking free from social media (at least temporarily) far outweighs whatever you think you’re missing out on. And if it’s better for you to just break up with social media completely, then that’s just as valid. Sometimes a break isn’t enough to fix the problem, and though most people are on social media, it’s not impossible to live without it.
Social media isn’t inherently bad, but it’s beneficial to realize that our attitudes toward it need to change to protect our mental health and society as a whole. With that, it’s also important to enjoy your time on social media while holding yourself and whatever platforms you use accountable. This means not allowing what you see on social media to get you down, but rather lift you up and make you happy.
Most of the time, how we see social media comes down to our outlook. Once you shift your perspective, your relationship can become that much more fulfilling.