Feeling alone in an empty room, a clique but a common feeling used to describe the emptiness someone feels when they are in a room filled with people. Maybe you came to an event with one person and they had to go to the bathroom, so you are just standing there alone. There is a crowd of new faces all around you, but all you do is take out your phone to see what you 658 friends on Facebook are up to. Or, which one of your 500 Instagram followers just commented and liked your photo. Social media is met to connect us to people, give us an identity, make us feel part of something and is slowly taking away any sense of independence we ever had.

The things we do, the pictures we take and the moments we choose to cherish are depicted now on what we presume other people will enjoy. We never do anything for our own now, instead we try to figure out what our followers will like and what will get us that extra super-like on Tinder. As we dive deeper in an age driven by the power of social acceptance on media, we can find ourselves losing more of our individuality as we start to mold ourselves to fit the crowd of people we want to be part of. We get to choose what moments of our lives we share with them, the words we say and the status cue we wish to have. We mold ourselves into the image we think others will most enjoy.

We no longer can hold a conversation. We find awkward silence more. Nobody goes up to a someone in class to ask them out. But we wait to see their tinder profile appear on our screens before making the first move by sending a gif emoji. We no longer can sit in a class room and introduce ourselves to the person sitting next to us. Its a foreign concept that small talk. We need and learn for the world of social media to bring us somewhere familiar. Somewhere quaint and we know we are excepted.

We give parts of ourselves alway on social media. Making ourselves vulnerable. We find comfort in online friends and relationships. We hide behind a text message, because it gives us time to develop and idea and choose the way we want to sound when we say it. We can't have an actual conversation no more. We hide behind the screens. We stand in a crowded room, filled of potential real friends and resort to see what the fictional world of online has in store for us.

We spend more hours behind a screen, watching the world we call friends judge us as they like our photos and wonder why others didn't like it. We live in a world where we are looking for other people's acceptance and approval. Which photo will get most likes? That photo got less likes then my rest, I must take it down. When is a good hour to post on Instagram? Oh, I'm posting this to get so and so attention.

We are giving away our Independence to a world that does not exist. We are living within a code. Waiting for the next like to fill our breath.