For the last year, I decided that if I didn’t post for one of my friends birthdays then I wasn’t going to post for all. That decision came almost a year ago after a friend thought that I had forgotten their birthday. Yet I hadn’t.
Then I decided on multiple last attempts within the last year that I was also going to be going on Social Media cleanses. Social Media cleanses is basically when you take time off of social media. That came to me after a few friends had confessed to me that they felt lesser because of “highlighted highs of their lives”.
Social media in a nutshell is a glorified scrapbook that marks my “happy moments”. But one year ago I swore to keep some of my most special “happy moments” to the people who are in my daily life. In a way it was more fulfilling to keep those moments precious because the “need to broadcast” my life has past like a phase we just must push through.
Back to the point here, with all of these revelations last year at this time I made a vow to get off of social media. I decided that it was more important to call, Face Time, or go to dinner with my friends than post a picture on FB, Twitter, IG, and Snap. Sure its super cute and it gives you an instant gratification, but I don’t feel like you truly appreciate the love and the admiration put into a social media post as you do when you give someone a hug, toasts a drink, or share priceless moments.
I am not a bad friend for not posting on your day of birth. Your importance in my life has not gone forgotten nor are you less special because I didn’t post for your birthday. I don't expect you to post for my birthday either. I would rather that we hang out together and take pictures to keep for our sakes.
Get off of your phones, computers, and tablets. Go get outside and enjoy more of the moments. Stop sitting at a dinner table with people who you’ve not seen in weeks and treat them with the disrespect of being “socially unavailable” because you have to gossip about whatever you’re seeing on IG. Try to remember what we did when we were young and we had so much energy and so much to talk about.
So I hope I can challenge you to get off of media and rather celebrate.
