Letter to my younger self on the impact of social media
Dear 10 year old self,
At this point in your life, social media has just started to blossom. Everybody in your class is all over Facebook, and yet little do you know that parents will take over Facebook and become “dead” among our generation in a few years. Twitter has yet to gain momentum in popularity and Instagram is yet to be invented. But apps aside, here are three things how the world of social media will impact your life.
First of all, you will get FOMO. What’s that, you ask? It’s called the Fear Of Missing Out, and you will deal with it greatly. Sometimes you will wish you were born in your parents’ generation where you’d be better off NOT knowing how much fun the people around you are having. People will be constantly updating their lives through social media 24/7, and they will let you know. They will post every single little thing happening in their lives, even if you couldn’t care less. But the thing is, you WILL actually start to care. You will see those pictures and videos of your friends and classmates having a great time, and start to think “Why don’t I have friends like that?” or “Why wasn’t I invited?”. Inevitably, you will start to feel lonely and left out. And when you get to university, you will start to compare yourself to others and how much they accomplished versus how much you have accomplished. You will see posts of your friends and classmates’ achievements of winning competitions and scholarships, working in all sorts of companies/starting their own, and getting hired to work on some cool gigs while building up their resume. You’re going to compare yourself to them and think, “Wow, they’re really making the most of their time here/Look at all the things they’re accomplishing”, while you’re going to be staring at a screen, sitting by yourself on a couch in your living room. Word of advice: GET UP OFF THE COUCH AND GO DO SOMETHING. Maybe THEN you can achieve something, too.
Next, you will have to realize that while it may seem like someone’s whole world is on social media, thanks to their constant posting and updating, it is actually far from close. Social media is like an illusion. People will only post the highlights of their life, and it’s not because they want to show-off. It’s because the stuff that makes you human is not worth posting. And nobody will showcase that on social media for the whole world to see, because why should they? Nobody wants to be embarrassed or be seen in a negative light, or even worse, make those around them feel pity for them. That’s why you can’t take social media TOO seriously because people will only post the amazing parts of their day or their sole achievements, and completely omit the rest. It’s not that they’re perfect or better than you, it’s just that the hard work or blood, sweat and tears are never showcased online. This is another reason why you shouldn’t compare your life to someone else’s life that you see on social media, as they only show a tidbit. You don’t know what could be going on in that person’s life beyond closed doors, or should I say, social media. They could be suffering from financial issues or family issues and you would never know. They could seem and look “happy” online, but you’d be shocked to later find out that those same “happy” people which supposedly live their best lives online also suffer from depression or anxiety.
Now while it may seem like social media is all bad and no good, I’m here to cheer you up by saying it’s not. There’s one feature social media allows us to do that previous generations would have died to have. And that is….Talking to your favourite celebrities! That’s right, Victoria. Social media creates a wonderful opportunity for celebrities to connect with their fans and establish a bit more of a deeper connection by sharing more information about their lives. Never would your parents or grandparents have dreamt of being able to comment or like photos posted by the celebrity themselves or ever having the option of directly messaging them through their account. While each celebrity is different with some ignoring majority of their messages and others even replying back to some of them, just the sole POSSIBILITY of being able to talk to or message your favourite actor/singer/athlete, without ever having to buy a $500 ticket to meet them, is amazing. Our generation is the first to be able to do that kind of close, one-to-one interaction. While written fan letters and fan mail existed back then, nobody would expect getting a response back (or even having them read). This is why our generation is as close to the famous stars as we ever could be. Imagine if your parents or grandparents could have messaged Marilyn Monroe or Audrey Hepburn through their Twitter or Instagram account just. like. that. And all for the expense of nothing? Social media can be truly amazing.
All in all, your whole world is going to change thanks to social media, and even if you wanted to avoid it, you can’t. Social media is everywhere now and your future self will depend on it to move up in the career world, and to communicate with those friends that no longer live near you. But not to fret, because I’m sure you’ll do just fine.
From,
Your future self.
