One Side of the Story: The Struggle with Social Media

I know I have written a blog post like this before, but I have felt this message on my heart yet again… and what is on my heart often ends up on this blog.

I found myself struck time and time again by the difference between how we present ourselves on social media and who we are in real life. By no means am I trying to discourage or shame social media; I am an avid user of many platforms, and think it can be used as a source of connection and growth. However, I think about how often I present myself in one light when I so often feel different, internally. If you look at my Instagram or Facebook, I am having a blast. And this is true… but it’s only part of the story. While I am making incredible memories with my friends here at school and having an absolute blast, not every moment is as perfect as I present it in pictures and posts. I have been dealing a lot with a new peak in my anxiety and near anxiety attacks, I’ve been adjusting (and not always gracefully) to an incredibly busy and demanding schedule, and I am still very much healing from the end of my first serious, long-term relationship.

I think about how easy it would be for someone to look at me on social media and think that I am living a perfect, happy life. I am happy, so happy, but I still have some of my harder moments. My roommates have seen them. My mom and my best friends have heard about it. But people outside of this small group, and even some people I consider my close friends, have no idea about the struggles I’ve felt, they only know the happiness they’ve seen on my social media. This thought had popped into my mind a few nights ago, under less than ideal circumstances.

I have to be honest: the break up has been really freakin’ hard for me.  This isn’t a tale that hasn’t been told before. It’s that first real break up—your first love, and often inevitably, your first devastating heart break. And this realization struck me after one particularly hard night. I felt like, after seeing various posts and pictures on social media, that Max was happy and moved on, and I am long gone in his past. Max and I haven’t talked much since the break up, so I had nothing to judge by except his social media.

And in the middle of this sad place, that so many of us find ourselves in after a break up, I realized something: Max could feel the same exact way as me. I was only posting things that showed me smiling, having fun, and living it up. Although he may or may not be, what’s stopping Max from looking at my pictures and thinking that I am living it up, never thinking about the break up? That’s certainly how I present it.

Things get lost on social media. We blur out the rough edges and present our best versions of ourselves. And when we pretend to know someone on social media alone, as we so often do (especially in college), we never get the whole story. We just don’t. As badly as I wish it wasn’t true, Max and I have hardly talked since we broke up, which I know this is necessary for now. I hope it’s not forever, but for now, social media is all I have to know Max off of. And how little of the story I know. Maybe Max has completely moved on and never thinks about me, but I just don’t know because about all I have is social media.

So, through a very emotional, personal experience, I was reminded of how limiting and sometimes hurtful social media can be. Just remember that the next time you’re scrolling through Instagram or Facebook, that all of these ‘perfect’ people are real, beautiful and flawed people who have hardships just like you. If you’re healing from a break up, take those pictures you see with a grain of salt. Never forget that we only get one side of the story.

#worry #relationships #socialmedia #September2017 #anxiety #life #college #lessonslearned