Social media and deception

Social media is like air to me- every night before I go to bed instead of actually going to sleep I find myself browsing pictures, news feeds most which are irrelevant to me but it is 11.45 pm and I am in no mood to get into some intellectual deep book either so some quick browsing will do.

Pictures of holidays, beaches and cheesy quotes, the kind of quotes that make my skin crawl a little bit, you know like those, ‘live, laugh’ kind of quotes. Men my age posting photos of themselves with five or six scantly dressed girls trying to look cool and other girls posting pictures of themselves pouting excessively captioned, ‘squad goals’ when really most likely they barely know each other but the picture looks great so why not? Post!

Social media is great in a way, you can create the ‘perfect’ world you want others to see. Post a photo of yourself buying an expensive pair of high heels at Selfridges, envious girls will think you are ‘ballin’. Post a photo of yourself on a yacht, gold diggers will think wow, I must get to know him when really you hired that boat with ten other guy friends for the day but those three seconds of attention from the opposite sex and the number of likes will make an insecure boy feel oh so good for just once in his life.

I have a lot of friends who sometimes come to me and tell me how they feel sad, that they don’t have that life and I find myself wondering why they would let a few pictures and quick likes affect their happiness. One thing I learnt as I got older is that nobody posts the bad days or the bad moments of their life because nobody wants to know. Society for some reason is really impressed if you are sitting in first class on a plane and like your selfie but will think you are rather average for taking a selfie in the park.

As a young woman, I myself am too am obsessed with pictures- but I on the other hand do it for memories as I like to keep a collection of all my favourite moments but it doesn’t mean that if I am sitting in one of the best restaurants in London that I don’t have my fair share of problems. A picture is a picture and it means nothing more- I remember when I was 22 and I had broken up with this boy I was totally in love with, he posted a photo of himself in a hot new club (back in the day) with a smug look and a drink in his hand, it really ruined my day. Only to learn a year later that he was still in love with me and was just hiding under a façade but I was young, I didn’t know any better.

However, social media is great too- I love to see my friends doing amazing things with their lives, whether it is getting married, getting that job they really wanted or having their first kid and it is a pleasure to see how life is beautiful even though at times it may not feel it is! But nobody really knows what goes on behind closed doors, that cute couple posting photos and sickly comments may actually be having some serious problems and that beautiful girl tanning in St Tropez may actually be the loneliest girl who probably cries now and then but she isn’t going to put that up on social media is she?

Ok for a minute, let us forget about the material fake happiness but what about the false body images being portrayed on my news feed every day. Girls with tiny un realistic little waists, huge hips and even bigger lips sure must affect our younger generation in the worst way. We forgot what real beauty was which is to be unique and now every girl seems to look the same; making the girl that looks different feel like she should look like them and now all of a sudden we have so many clones. But this has been somewhat an old crisis, when I was a little girl I wanted to be blond and blue eyed like all my other girlfriends and now as I grow older all women seem to want is to be tanned, with thick eye brows and dark eyes which are my natural traits.

It is natural to want all these things, the nice holidays, the big bouquet of flowers and that perfect boyfriend but what is more important is to love yourself. I honestly think my generation of women have forgotten to love themselves- if we really did love ourselves we wouldn’t be so easily fooled or upset about pictures or a life style.

I was having drinks with a beautiful 19 year old girl in the west end and she was telling me how disheartened she gets when her friends seem to be living this decadent life style and she isn’t and I had to explain to her that, ‘Hey, it takes a second for someone to pose for a perfect picture and that holiday to France, well that holiday life style isn’t every day and if you keep comparing yourself to everyone then nothing in this world could ever make you happy’

But these things are learnt with age and maturity, in the meantime pictures, status’s and check ins should be just a log for your own memories, something for you to look at and be like, wow I was blessed to do this and this and blessed to meet so and so, it shouldn’t be a tool for one to get depressed or envious because no one really knows what is really going on behind that perfect picture.

No one.