How Social Media Poisoned My Friendships

Social media provides a platform for one to project perfection. My passive consumption of this content led me to believe that everyone else’s life was an unwavering constant of happiness.

Silly boomerangs. Chic aesthetic. Matching outfits. Effortless smiles.

In reality my Instagram, Facebook is a highlights reel of each person’s carefully selected moments of their life to be advertised. Composed images and captions projecting an appearance of a composed life.

Witty or thought provoking. Silly or serene. I wanted it all.

I began to blur the lines of these perfect moments from each individual into one beautifully, happy, effortlessly perfect person.

Even those who weren’t projecting perfection couldn’t win. Somehow even just watching other’s embrace their imperfect life, still felt genuinely perfect.

It became even worse is when I mixed in people I didn’t even know at all. Increasing my constant consumption of content from hundreds of people to thousands. From Facebook groups to random Twitter accounts. From Instagram influencers to YouTube celebrities. And worst offender: Pinterest — picture perfect peak perfection.

Adding this into the mix only tinted my perception of everyone else’s life with a haze of perfection. Because my brain would distort each friend’s unique story into one generalized super-perfect life. Someone who can ‘do it all’.

Curated social media will mess with your head like that.

Of course not everyone isn’t perfect. In fact, nobody is.

I need to lower my holier-than-thou expectations because there never was — and there never will be — a perfection standard to live up to. I don’t need to spend even one more ounce of energy trying to achieve that. Or fretting that I haven’t. Because it just doesn’t exist.

Honestly, I couldn’t even tell this process was happening in my brain. The constant comparison. The low-key buildup of tension. I thought social media would bring me closer to my friends always catching up on their lives. Helping me celebrate their everyday life. The internet allowed me to spend a minimal amount of effort to create the maximum amount of connections. But it was the distribution of my attention to hundreds of friends (or thousands of people I don’t even know at all) which led me feeling even more disconnected to them.

It was the acquaintances that fell into this trap the easiest. I was missing the whole story. The details. The emotion. The pauses. The caveats. The cadence of normal conversation. Good or bad — I need to know it all. I care about my friends and connecting only on a curated surface level would only blend their lives into the crowd. So I need to minimize the extras so I can maximize my deeper connection with my friends. Consume social media with intention rather than with a passive hypnosis to kill time.

I’d love to wrap this up by announcing I’m going to quit social media all together. But…let’s be honest I’m not going to. Its an addiction I’m not ready to let go of. But for those of you who have quit the hamster wheel, how did it change your life? Was it small and indescribable or was it just what you needed. I genuinely would like to know. It may just be the encouragement I need to quit the bad habit for good.