Social Media Is An Unhealthy Popularity Contest But You Can Drop Out From The Race

Social media is a huge popularly contest, it always has been and it always will be.

It's easy to post a photo and see instant gratification when the likes and comments start flooding in. It makes us feel good to have people enjoy what we post, especially in the form of a heart on our pictures. But it can also feel terrible when you see everyone around you get at least over 100 or 200 likes on whatever they post and you struggle to get above 50.

The truth is that social media is mindless. If it's easy for someone to digest, like a photo, people will look at it for maybe one second, give it a like, and continue scrolling.

Nobody tears apart our posts as badly as we do our own.

This can be both good and bad. Sometimes we want people's eyes to linger a couple seconds to appreciate every detail of our posts. Sometimes it's better to not have someone tear apart your subpar image. Either way, you can't control what interests every single person, so you need to let go of the pressure to fit a picture-perfect image that bloggers often portray.

In the simplest of terms, people on social media are straight up lazy. If it requires them to sit there for a minute watching a video and for them to turn up sound, they're going to scroll past. But if you have someone actually interested in taking the time to look at your post, it is going to have such a greater impact and remain of the memory of those who watch it. It's hard because you can't always know who actually takes the time and you won't always see or hear about how much someone enjoyed your work, but you have to believe that they did.

Comparing yourself to other people's interactions on social media is a dangerous game. It will only be a one-sided competition between you and this other person who has no idea how much you feel threatened by their actions. You're only pouring out your energy into something that will only leave you feeling inadequate. It's easier said than done, but instead of counting likes and comments, just turn off your notifications.

If you're an introverted person like me, you may only have a few close friends which doesn't always show very well on social media. Because we don't pour ourselves into many people, we won't see a greater amount of people pouring into us, and this also translates on social media. It's incredibly easy to compare yourself to extroverted people because they wear their lives on their sleeves. But us introverts are reserved and don't always show everything so it's easy to forget the great things we do. Remind yourself that just because someone may get more likes than you does not mean they are better than you.

Only post the things in your life for yourself that bring you happiness. Use your Facebook as a reference for you to see your own progress over the course of a year. Use Instagram as a photo book of your life and best moments for you to look back on and smile. Use Twitter as a stream of thoughts for you to document the ups and downs of life (but be careful not to use it as a therapist). In the end, do what is best for you in the long run and forget the numbers on your posts.