We’ve all heard that famous quote "A picture is worth a thousand words.” And while I’ve been guilty of saying it and probably believing it at times, recently it has hit me just how untrue that statement is. Maybe in a long distant past those words were true, but now we live in the internet age where our pictures are perfectly crafted; and if they do say a thousand words, they’re so heavily filtered, posed and photoshopped that they can’t possibly be the actual words that they were meant to say. For the most part these days the pictures we allow others to see of ourselves are perfectly calculated. The only pictures on our Instagram feeds are the ones where we look the happiest and slimmest, with a perfectly clever caption so we seem funny and up to date with the popular movement of the moment.
Recently, I was sitting with some friends minding my own business when I heard a young girl talking to another girl. The first girl was going on and on about how cute the second girl and her boyfriend were and how they were 'total relationship goals.' (her words, not mine) The girl's words surprised me. Mainly because I know the couple, and I know their relationship. It suddenly made sense to me that the reason the girl would say this is because the only real thing she knows about them is what they put out for people to see on their social media. Behind closed doors though, or shall we say, behind the phone screen, is a far different story than the cute lovey dovey captions and heart emojis.
It all made sense to me then that while we're busy obsessing over relationship goals, and artsy edits on our pictures we're missing the point. Our pictures are meant to tell our story, to tell truths about ourselves, but when we take a deep look can we even find ourselves in them? We're all guilty of it. We've all posted a picture where the group looks so fun and happy but in reality it took eight tries to get that picture, and by the end everyone was just forcing a smile to get it over with. I know I've spent hours editing pictures and thinking of cute captions to go with them. I've checked my followings and even deleted pictures that I didn't think were flattering of myself. But, why? What's the point? I'm no Taylor Swift, is my "image" really that important? Some would say so.
We live in a world where approval and acceptance comes with how many followers and likes we get, not things with actual substance. But is that the kind of people we really want to be? Maybe, if instead of idolizing someone's relationship, or life, for that matter based on the pictures we see we should become content with our own little story. And maybe instead of believing everything we see, we should try looking deeper inside. Maybe then pictures really can be worth a thousand words again. Instead of a couple cheap sentences that have no meaning or truth.
