I'll be the first to say that I love social media. I'm always checking my feed far too many times in a day, and I am not denying that. However, have you ever stopped to think about what it's doing to you and even worse: your relationship. While social media gives us the power and opportunity to keeps tabs on just about anyone imaginable, this has become a blessing and a curse. We are spending the entirety of our days comparing ourselves to what we see through the screens of others. And we all know everyone is putting their best foot forward when it comes to what we let social media reveal about us.
Everyone out there seems so picture perfect. They have the cutest pictures, the most envious outfits, locations, filters, captions, anything- you name it, we are jealous of it. Couples have every right to reveal their love for one another to the world through social media; the downfall of it is when we start comparing our own relationship to the one on your iPhone. We're following "The Bachelor" contestants and their significant other constantly wondering 'WHY?!" Why doesn't my relationship look like that? Why don't we go on dates like that? Why, why, why....?
Jealousy is one of the seven deadly sins for a reason. It doesn't take long for these picture-perfect romances to start affecting your own. The bar has been raised. But has it been raised maybe a bit too much? Can your boyfriend really provide you the same kind of elaborate date idea the same way the ABC production team can execute one? The answer is probably no. We start putting this immense pressure on our significant other for them to keep raising the bar. We set ourselves up to be let down.
Not only does it spark jealousy, it can also start an obsession. You start digging into who are they are following, who follows them, whose posts are they liking, and on and on. This opens up even more possibilities of causing what wouldn't be a problem normally into an obnoxious argument. Once again, you're setting yourself up for more upsets in your relationship.
We need to take a step back. We need to remember what's on social media doesn't exactly reflect reality. You have to remember that those couples aren't posting about their own struggles and insecurities they're overcoming in their personal relationship. Nobody has a perfect relationship. That's not real love.
