My love hate relationship with social media...

Do you find yourself going on a social media sites like Facebook, Instagram or Twitter and the next thing you know hours have passed and it's time you can't get back and nothing really productive has happened? Consider this my social media confession. I have a love hate relationship with social media. I love the fact that Facebook allows me to stay connected to people that  I ordinarily would have lost contact with based on life happening. Instagram allows me to connect with people all over the world that have similar interest as me in a fun, creative and inspirational way. Twitter allows me to stay in the know of current events as well as put information out that I want people to know from a business point of view.

Social Media has it's place in our modern day society for sure. However, it is a thief of time. It has also had an equally negative impact on just about everything in modern society. It has made us all a little more narcissistic, self absorbed, insecure, self-righteous, all-knowing, egotistical, and just flat out mean at times. I have to wonder, were we already this way and social media is simply the vehicle that brought it out? I admire people that exist in this world with little to no ties to social media. I think they have a super power of some kind, regarding their ability to resist. 

Now to be clear, social media makes me laugh so hard I cry sometimes. I love seeing pictures of people's children, pets, birthdays, weddings, engagement, first day of school, graduations, all the special moments of life that 10 years ago you would have either had to be there, view a photo album later or actually listen to someone's story about the moment using your imagination to create and paint a picture in your mind... imagine that. There is value in social media, I mean were it not for social media, you most likely would not be reading this blog right now. 

I did say I love seeing the pictures and yes it can be cool to see them in an instant, in the moment but if we are all honest we bombard people with our special moments and as a result we are bombarded. We seem to have regressed back to a time of "you show me yours and I'll show you mine." We all know deep down inside that no one really wants to see a bazillion pictures of your child's first day of school, okay maybe their grandparents, but that's it. No one really wants to see trillion pictures of your vacation photos. Who is really interested in me sitting at my desk at work or me in the gym, I mean seriously, be honest? Who really cares about all my "Check-Ins?" I'm just saying, many of us have conditioned ourselves to believe everyone is genuinely interested in every aspect of our lives, so much so that they want to see play by play, minute by minute day by day. Do you really think people want to see a picture of you driving in your car? Seriously? Really? Okay maybe the gym pictures do provide some inspiration for those that may be struggling, I'll give you that. 

Can we all just be honest here for a minute and admit that we are not that interesting, cute, fit, smart, funny, fabulous or exciting, can we go there? Now for the record, I am guilty as charged. I am preaching to myself. I love me some selfies, but truth be told, life is meant to be more than just a photo shoot. I recently went to a conference where the facilitator reminded everyone about how important it is to live in the present and how children naturally live in the present. In thinking about it, I found it to be so true. It always makes me just a little sad when I see parents take so many pictures of their children that by the 50th photo the child looks absolutely miserable. What are we teaching our kids with with all these pictures. What's the internal messaging going on? Do we really want them to think they are only as valuable as their number of likes? 

Now that I have preached to the choir, what am I going to do about my love hate relationship with social media? I'm going to begin limiting my time on social platforms. Forgive me in advance if I miss your birthday or special moment! Just know that I'm out living, enjoying the moments life has to offer. I will no longer surf while watching TV, unless it's a game, because you have to post about that amazing catch that some player made in the moment lol. I think I'll break my time up into twice a day and see how that works. I mean there are only so many hours in the day and if I'm spending more than an hour on social media, how productive can I be really? Well that's what I'm going to do. I can't tell you what to do but I would encourage to you to evaluate your social media time and see if you are missing out on living your life while holding yourself hostage to watching the lives of others, let me know what you discover. 

​In the meantime wish me luck!