Oops. It's been a while. It's been a combination of college apps, school and well, social media (perfect segway I know, thank you thank you)
I recently ranted to my boyfriend about how harmful Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter etc are. They are inescapable platforms that allow others to broadcast their lives in your face. They force you to obsessively refresh your newsfeed, to think of the best hashtags for the most likes, to care about how many (meaningless) "likes" something gets, and worst of all: to feel horrible about being excluded. I know I'm not alone when I say this - seeing a Snapchat story of all my friends at a party I wasn't invited to SUCKS. If I didn't have a smartphone or if I lived in the '90s, I wouldn't even know, and I would save myself the pain (at least the immediacy of such pain).
Social media is degrading my self-esteem. I feel like I need 40+ likes on an Instagram picture to feel redeemed. That's bullshit. It's gotten so bad that I purchased an app to get more followers. I know. I hate myself too. But that's my point! Even I, who is well aware of this black hole we are all getting sucked into, allows myself to be dragged down. That's how powerful this multi-national phenomenon is.
Plus, everything is done on the interwebs now. I found out about my college acceptance from the internet (I thought you were better than that Harvard). I like handwritten letters thank you very much. And, alerting the college that I will be attending is completed with just the simple click of a button to indicate a check. How sad and impersonal :(
I've been thinking about getting a flip phone or deactivating Facebook (I already deleted it from my iPhone) and I may end up following through with one or both of these plans. For the time being, I am focused on being more aware. And may you be too!
*p.s. thought I would point out that my favorite english teacher (but also, my favorite teacher ever) once told me to avoid parentheses but I think they give a nice aside/comedic effect (look at me now Ms. Jamison - ironically, she was the first person to introduce me to blogger)
*p.p.s. Yalies, I hope this doesn't change your mind about my blog. I'm a good person, I promise (#gocrimson)
