Social media tends to get a bad rap.
And not without good reason.
I think most of us have experienced that deep dissatisfaction—and even heartache—that social media can quickly inflict upon us: when you’re home alone on a Friday night and see that your friends are all hanging out without you...
...or when you see that you weren’t invited to be a part of an event that everyone you know is somehow attending…
...or when it feels like everyone on your newsfeed is getting engaged while you’re still single, buying a house while you’re broke, or having kids while you’re struggling through infertility.
We’re exposed to everyone else’s highlight reels: bombarded with people’s glossy vacation photos, blogger moms’ Pinterest-worthy homes, and friends’ perfectly filtered selfies.
Social media can bring up a lot of pain, and quickly causes us to start playing the comparison game: the more we endlessly scroll, the more dissatisfied we become with our lives. Our anxiety levels rise higher and higher. Depression creeps nearer and nearer.
It’s no wonder that young adults are lonelier than any other generation.
Not only that, but social media also seems to be exacerbating preexisting divisions within our culture: causing us to become more and more polarized as we shout louder over those we deem “other.”
All it takes is a look into the comments section of a Facebook post or a Youtube video for me to lose my faith in humanity for the day.
It’s been a struggle for me. I often have to take breaks from social media, because it sucks me in. Whenever I start looking at the numbers next to the tiny heart at the bottom of my Instagram posts as a numeric representation of my worth, I realize that it might be time for another break.
And, honestly, I’ve had to periodically unfollow people if the apparent “perfection” of their lives has gotten too far under my skin and caused me to feel inadequate.
BUT. In spite of all of this junk…
I’m really really grateful for social media.
Why?
Because it’s given this introvert a VOICE.
At a very early age, I discovered that it was far easier for me to communicate through the written word than any other form of communication.
As a deep-feeling, deep-thinking introvert, I have so many thoughts, so many words, so many stories inside of me that are never quite sure how to come out. I have entire worlds inside my heart & my mind that, without social media, would probably never see the light of day.
Social media has given me a platform to be able to express myself: putting words and images to the deepest longings of my heart, giving me a chance to speak out about the things I’m passionate about.
John, a lawyer from Kenya who we met at the US/MX border in Tijuana. He left Kenya in the hope of finding a better life in the United States, first by taking a boat across the Atlantic to South America, and then by traveling five long months up to the border.
Because of social media, I’ve been able to share stories that I never would have been able to share otherwise: stories of the breathtakingly beautiful people I’ve been able to meet, everywhere from Grand Rapids to Kathmandu.
And, through those stories, people’s perspectives have been changed. I’ve learned that people’s views on refugees have changed, simply because I wrote a few emails about a trip to Jordan, expressing a few of the stories I heard there.
Social media has offered me an opportunity to showcase the beauty in the people I meet, telling their stories that might never be told otherwise: it’s one thing to hear terms like “refugee crisis” or “caravan at the border…” but it’s another thing to see the faces of the people behind those phrases. It’s another thing to hear their stories.
Their stories move you to stop thinking of these events as simply political or social issues, and start thinking about the human beings that are affected by them. It humanizes people that we are tempted to think of as “other”. Listening to people’s stories eliminates the “us” vs “them” mentality that we so easily get sucked into, and suddenly, everyone just becomes “us.”
I hope that the stories that I’ve had the privilege to tell have helped to do that, even just a tiny bit.
Through social media, I’ve also been able to voice the things I’m struggling with, in the hopes that my story and struggles will encourage other people.
I’m someone who values authenticity and vulnerability a LOT, so I decided, a long time ago, that I wasn’t going to try to hide behind some sort of perfect mask on social media. That’s just not who I am. So, I’ve used social media as a platform to talk openly about my struggle with anxiety, the heartache of singleness, questions and doubts that I wrestle with God about. And, honestly, the amount of people who respond to those posts astounds me every time.
And when I see other people being honest and raw about the things they’ve been wrestling with, or using social media to tell the stories of beautiful & broken people, I’m so incredibly inspired.
As I’ve pressed into this weird digital world, I’ve realized that one of the most important things to examine is my motivation: every time I get ready to post something, I try to ask myself, “what are my motives for posting this?”
“Am I just posting this because I want to show off my photography skills? Because I want people to see all of the cool places I’ve been to? Because I think I look really good in this photo? Because I want people to see how cute my house is, how perfectly this recipe turned out, or how good of a person I am?”
If the answer to any of those questions is “yes…” then I probably shouldn’t be posting it.
And, honestly, there are some photos that I don’t think I’ll ever share on social media, simply because they’re far too personal, or because I want to honor the person in that photo.
I definitely don’t do this perfectly; I’ll often overanalyze my motives to the point where I’m scared to post anything! Heck, it took me forever to even publish this blog post, because I was so desperate to pick the “perfect” images for it.
I’ve had to accept the fact that I can’t control other people’s perceptions of me: I can only control what my motives are.
But, here’s a question for all of us: what if we all started to think a little more critically about what and why we post to social media?
And what if we all started using these platforms to be a little more vulnerable and honest about the sucky things we’re dealing with?
Maybe vulnerability on social media isn’t for you… but it’s something to think about.
I think we all could use little reminders that we’re all human. We’re all messy and flawed and broken and struggling. Why are we so afraid to let people see that?
What if we used social media as a chance to build other people up, reach out to people we haven’t heard from in a while, and learn about the perspectives of people who believe vastly different things than us, rather than tearing each other down, arguing with each other in the comments sections, and posting incendiary things just to get a rise out of each other?
I’ve never seen anyone’s mind changed because of an argument they had on social media… but I have had my perspective changed by hearing someone’s story.
Just a thought.
Here’s the thing, my friends: social media is just a tool.
It is what we make it.
Just like the computer, the television, the radio, the printing press, and every other technological invention before it, social media can be used for good OR evil.
Let’s use it wisely.
Other than photo #2, which was taken from Unsplash, the photos in this post were taken by me.
I took photos 3 & 5 at a refugee camp at the Mexico/US border in Tijuana, as the first round of caravans of asylum seekers reached the border and waited for the chance to possibly cross over into the United States. We had the chance to sit down with many of them and listen to their stories.