Social Media- where does it end for you?
Where does social media end in your life? If that isn’t an easy question to answer, then perhaps its time to have a think about the role internet communication has in your perception of what is important.
Social media has come to mean different things to different people since it really became part of modern life some 20 years ago. Today it can be something of a catch all term used to describe anything from in-game experiences to minute-by-minute live feeds that detail the user’s approach to life (perhaps in ways they don’t clearly understand at the time).
Much of the media portrays and excitedly extols the virtues of social media – urging viewers, listeners or users to participate in events and tell the world how they feel or what they have been doing. For many people, this activity is a source of excitement- perhaps a chance to showcase how well we feel we are doing or tell our peers that we are successful. Even the act of communicating with a celebrity or favourite personality can bring with it a sense of positivity and belonging for some.
Although perhaps not as well publicised, the downsides of social media interactions are characterised by abuse, bullying and a sense of missing out -which can spiral into our normal lives as quickly as a message arriving on our feed or timeline. Even the lack of a message can prove destructive as any user of WhatsApp will know. The idea that we are being ignored, overlooked or drowned out is corrosive and perhaps the most common complaint I will hear at Assisi Therapy in Salisbury. Those WhatsApp groups can be a particular source of pain for individuals. The pressure to respond in a witty way, or scroll through dozens of messages- swamping any sense that you are part of the group, can lead to a feeling of alienation and low self-worth even in the nicest company.
Anxiety around our position in the group goes at least as far back as our earliest human ancestors, millions of years ago. In modern settings, like work, school or in our leisure pursuits we can be driven by the urge to impress group members so that we will be included in the group and saved from rejection. Clients in therapy and counselling will be reacting to this dynamic often without being fully conscious of it. This makes sense in the context of an early hominid (human ancestor) or a hunter gatherer society. There it was literally a matter of life or death whether we stayed within the protection of the group or were rejected and left to wander the fringes where the shadows grew dark and danger lurked.
What social media in all its forms has done, is create an intensely competitive environment in a couple of decades which is poorly regulated and whose sole motivation (really) is to make money for the few people who created it. That is not even a generation in human years and so short a period of time in evolutionary terms that we can have no appropriate response to it. Most users are on their platform of choice to further or better themselves in some way. This can include impressing people we are attracted to, people we would like to emulate or people who have a direct influence on where we think we stand in society (see LinkedIn). So many powerful drives, crammed into a device that we carry around with us, active all day, every day and which can come through unfiltered when we least expect them.
Regardless of whether they realise it, Social Media is a huge cause of anxiety and stress for its users. Understanding that you don’t need to impress the world can be a huge relief. Indeed, working out who is really important to interact with can be a genuinely beneficial exercise for clients at Assisi Therapy. It allows your inner hominid to relax and enjoy life, rather than worrying about what is lurking in the shadows.