In the age of instant gratification, our iPhone is our best friend, and we constantly have everything we need or could want right in our pockets. Technology is great, and I’m definitely not saying I want to go back to the age of brick phones and dial-up internet, but I’ve noticed something recently:

Pictures don’t mean as much as they used to.

Ever since I can remember, my Dad always had a camera in my face: snapping pictures of everything and everywhere we went. I remember thinking it was a little bit annoying, but now, looking back at the physical photos I have, I couldn’t be happier.

It seems so real, to have a printed out copy – a photo in a book labeled with the date handwritten on the back, and the negatives next to it. I worry for our kids, who will only have memories on iPhone cameras.

I know a lot of people go through this, thinking that digital doesn’t last, but I’ve been feeling like there’s a bigger issue – the fact that pictures have lost their significance since they've become purely digital.

When you had to constantly buy film, develop photos, and carry a physical camera around, I feel like pictures meant more. It was a calculated decision, taking a photo. It was something you NEEDED to remember.

A feeling took over you as you pushed down the button and heard the click capturing your memory.

Now, with iPhones, pictures are less calculated. We can take 100 of an almost identical picture and pick our favorite, deleting the rest without a second thought. We look at our phones instead of the view, editing the photo and changing the reality of where we took it.

In the past, a photo was a memory – biased or not – that you couldn’t really change. A picture still existed if you looked fat, or blinked, or someone’s finger was in the way of the lens. Now, all these ‘mistakes’ are doomed to live somewhere in the archive of digital junk, never to be thought about again.

But I would argue there's beauty in these photos that we try so hard to get rid of because they reflect the real experiences we have.

I know it’s cliché to say life is about the journey, but I think in this instance, life is about the imperfections of the journey – the pictures that aren’t perfect, but show the legitimate story.

This is why I think we should go back to actually taking photos, because it’ll capture the true, imperfect, moments of our lives – something that an iPhone just can’t do as well.

We need to go back to treasuring our film...so please, go pick up a disposable camera, gather up your friends, and see how much better your photos come out.