Filtered Perfection
By: Bushra AlMansour
"The reason we struggle with insecurity is because we compare our behind-the-scenes with everyone else's highlight reel." -Steven Furtick
We live in a world where we frequently see the edited version of people’s lives. We’re constantly reminded that others (whether its people we know or not) are living better lives than we are. A scroll down a typical Instagram feed is likely to reveal only incredible vacations photos from exotic places, parties of a lifetime, new purchases, dream homes, attractive couples in a relationship and healthy breakfast plated like a pro. All captured in perfect light and enhanced with editing tools.
Everyone looks like they’re having the best day ever, all the time!
Magazines have long been criticized for setting unrealistic standards of beauty and lifestyle, but it’s acknowledged that they are idealized. The models wearing size 0 clothing are just airbrushed ‘models’.
These days, the impossible standards are set closer to home, not by models and celebrities but by family and friends. Naturally, we are influenced by what we see our peers do. The problem is, social media skews our perception of reality.
Most of us, the active users, are selective of what we share on social media and tend to paint a picture that makes our lives look more interesting, whether it’s subconscious or not, but we forget that others do it, too. We’d take other people’s posts at face value.
Some of the posts we see from social media influencers (who are paid to wear or endorse products) are targeted advertising, like the Youtuber who uploads a sponsored workout routine video in his/her brand-new training shoes.
Social media created a false set of benchmarks for beauty and happiness, and that’s a trap for a certain generation. We are pressured to look our best and live an interesting life just to obtain approval from others as a form of self-validation.
Even if you’re just a passive observer, it’s likely that you’ll start to feel like your life doesn’t measure up if it wasn’t one amazing moment after another.
It isn’t fair to compare our lives to another person’s five-second snapchat story, forgetting that they only chose what they want you to see and believe about themselves.
The colleague who just added a promotion to their LinkedIn page would never tweet about how they’re being bullied or harassed at work.
I’m not saying they should, it just shouldn’t make us feel inadequate in real life.
Personally, I enjoy browsing Pinterest for inspiration. Be it home-decor mood boards, cities I would like to visit one day, recipes, tutorials and DIYs I know I’m too lazy to try.
The moral point is that not all filtering is bad. We just need to learn to not to criticize our lives based on the artfully curated social media images and resist the pressure to create false images just to come across as interesting and popular. We should share pictures that make us feel happy (without fear of judgement), be creative and embrace who we authentically are.
If you find yourself comparing your life to complete strangers to the extent that it’s getting a little unhealthy, then maybe it’s time to log-off and take a social media detox!
Comments
Post a Comment