By Quincy Rosser
Before social media, our experiences were our own. You were able to walk through college- and life- unaware of what everyone else was doing. Now, it can almost feel like people on the internet, maybe across the country or even the world, secretly have a say in every personal decision one makes. TikTok has made it nearly impossible to experience college without considering how everyone else is experiencing it, too.
             While scrolling through endless videos of apartment tours, GRWM videos, hauls and studying tips can be entertaining, it can also work against your own satisfaction. Constantly viewing and comparing your life to someone else can make your own daily routine seem bland or even depressing. When I see Katie Fang in her high-rise apartment in NYC or Avery Kroll getting ready to go out with her friends, suddenly my weekend of working, studying and watching Netflix seems utterly boring. Although the lesson may feel like a broken record, we forget that we are only shown a small portion of someone’s life through their social media. We are only shown the best parts of what they want us to see.
             Growing up, I heard stories about college from my mom and aunts, stories from a time when there were no expectations curated by social media. They met new people organically and made plans without documenting them. They would often say, “Thank goodness we weren’t being watched and recorded all the time.” During my first few years of college, I remember feeling so envious of them being able to have a “real” college experience, instead of one that felt like it was constantly being compared to what I saw online. I wondered if I was missing out on something simply because my college experience did not look like the ones I saw on TikTok. Being a young college student and constantly consuming extravagant content from people my age made it difficult to separate my experiences from the ones I was watching through a screen.
             If everyone made content showing their real day-to-day lives, chances are they wouldn’t be too popular. They would probably be much more ordinary- waking up late, rotting on the couch for hours, doing homework, eating the same dinner you have eaten for the past four nights. But these videos don’t tend to perform well on TikTok.
             This is where I think TikTok has changed the ways in which we allow ourselves to experience college. We are not just watching other people live their lives; we are analyzing their lives and using them as a measurement for how much we enjoy our own. Even if we understand that a two-minute video can’t possibly show every mundane task someone completes, it is still easy to wonder why our lives do not feel exciting anymore.
             So maybe the goal isn’t to convince ourselves that everything is fake, or that our lives must be worthy enough to be posted online. College shouldn’t feel like a series of perfectly planned opportunities for content or like a race against your peers and friends. When I look back on the last three years, the best, most exciting nights have been the ones that seem ordinary in the moment. Maybe they weren’t “aesthetic” enough to post, but I didn’t feel like I had anything to prove anything anyway. These are the moments that are worth remembering- not because they look good to everyone else, but because they felt good in real life. And that’s enough, whether strangers online agree with you or not.