When I was younger social media was an extremely important topic to my overall life, I used almost everything, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. I used to post, share, and tweet constantly to visualize my wide array of emotions from joyous to agitated. During which I was having the time of my life, expressing my thoughts and beliefs to anybody who would listen, I thought I was so cool. In my mind, I was taking the world by my hand and letting people know all the things they didn’t already. Yet, every time I got off I had to sit beside myself and actualize in what way I wanted people to perceive me. This progressed into me saying whatever I thought was going to get likes, I was marketing myself as a product. In time, it led to hurt feelings, anxiety & depression. I was so obsessed with the sound of a notification, that it had become somewhat similar to a drug, and I was an active abuser. Staying up later than planned to see who would like my creation and what they would say about it, misjudging my own being because I was afraid I wasn’t what I portrayed myself to be on these apps. With age, I learned my dependency on these networks was a shallow attempt to receive attention, though it took the time I learned from these negative feelings that the most important thing to do for my own sanity and overall mental health was to completely quit.

Nowadays, I try to avoid any form of social media entirely and focus on spoken communication with other individuals, this is difficult in a world where most everything is done online, yet, as long as I’m speaking truth to my name I feel like it’s ethical. I’m not perfect, I still love watching YouTube videos and slightly peaking into the comment section to see what other people are saying, but nowadays, I myself don’t reply. I think it is important for me to remember the way I got addicted to it, and the gross feeling I would feel afterward. However, this is my personal feeling towards it, some people are able to maintain a strong grip between what’s real and not, and can find positive ways to use these apps like networking and reconnecting with old friends.